A week ago I had my Close of Service (COS) conference where myself and all the volunteers who arrived in Senegal with me came to Dakar and began our preparation to either return to the US or remain in Senegal.

It doesn't feel like it has been two years. There were hard times where I thought my service would never end (or mean anything) and I would look at my calender and count the months or days til my potential leave date. There was was a particular rough few weeks where I counted 286 days til my COS. However far more often and especially in these last 6 months my life has been one extraordinary event after another and my service more important to people as my projects were completed.

Sure I made the call home once where I seriously considered going home and I think almost every volunteer has had the moment. Mostly I think the calls have been "Guess what gastrointestinal parasite I have this week or this snake/chicken/cow/bat colony go into my room and man it just would not leave!"

Some fun experiences I've had:

-taking bucket baths during rain storms

-throwing frogs at my siblings (frogs terrify them) and they, in return, chasing me with dead spiders and scorpions.

-Operation Frog Annihilation with my brother Tidiane to remove the pests from my tree nursery

-while running in the forest scaring a pack of bush weasels, a giant pelican/penguin bird, various monkeys, and one giant golden furry bigfoot (which I am sure was just a very large golden baboon.)

-The first road kill I ever saw: monkey road kill

-Biking 40K into Kolda and not dying

-biking 60K to a new site and also not dying

-Being given chickens (5 total-all are dead now. 2 we ate, 1 died because I biked 20K with it hanging off my handlebars, 1 got sick and the other a snake got.)

-Playing with baby cows

-Camping at Segou Falls with Alan and Shelia where we got run out of our campsite in the middle of the night by hoards of ants, chased by barking chimpanzees, and then just when we thought we reached safety got caught in one of the firs flash thunderstorms of the rainy season.

-Biking past by a herd of over hundred monkeys on my way to a new site.

-Making my family chili for dinner (they were not fans.)

-Flagging down more free rides than I will ever get in America

-Out sassying the sassiest ladies in my village-"Girl you say my butt is big? Let me do a booty dance and show my butt is better than yours!" Never fails.

-Expressing my outrage in pulaar at the garage and putting some of the jerks in place.

-sharing my room with 13 bats who control my mosquito population.

-Having a rabies scare when a dog bit me

-comfortably talking about the frequency and type of bowel movements I have with other volunteers

-Pooping my pants. Yay brown badge.

-Getting Dengue fever

-Numerous stings and chemical burns by ear wigs and blister beetles.

-Being chased out of my room by a spider crab.

-eating organic fruits and veggies and free range meat all the time

- learning to recognize which animals are sick enough to point where we should eat them before they die.

But of course I have been in Senegal for more than just personal enjoyment. I've grown a lot and my perspective on the world has changed. When I leave my village the thing I will be most proud of is that I did everything I said I would do.

-Constructed a garden and well for increased food security

-Personally distributed over 500 nets in and around my village and then assisted in the 2010 Kolda Region net distribution which covered everyone person in the entire region.

-Increased the cashew orchards whose product ripens in March just in time to help the village buy food when all of our food that we harvested the previous fall has finished

-Planted more trees than I really know what to do with

-After a year and half of gentle prodding, submitted budgets, friendly greetings and finally one angry blow out got World Vision to agree to fix my school. The repairs haven't begun yet which means they could still back out on me but they have come with the school inspection (the Kolda equivalent of the school board) and entrepeunear to price everything out and guarentee the village an additional teacher so we won't have just one teacher for 48 students K-8.

-Met the 12 families of girls nominated for scholarships and explained to them the program and how their daughters are extremely gifted and should remain in school.

-Organized tree nursery trainings, gardening trainings, and one on one consults for farmers and specific tree projects.

And then there were times where I became more connected to my village.

-Saw one of my close friends give birth to her first daughter after she had seven sons. Beautiful baby Bana.

-Helped my village fight a forest fire that would have consumed our village.

-I helped my name sake pay for his medicine when he got malaria

-Carried other womens' babies on my back when they got tired and their children did not cry

-joined people under the meeting mango tree and was regarded as someone to talk TO not talk AT.

-Asking everyone man who came to village to find a wife how old he is and then all my village ladies (without me prompting them) tell him I think he is too old. They know me so well.

-Provided care for our local mason when he gouged his finger while working and it became extremely infected

-Cared for my little brother when his eyes became infected and filled with puss.

-Helped my mom get medicine when she got a bad case of parasites.

-Traveling to the bush villages by myself and meeting people who had never seen a white person before then they thought I was genie.

-chasing down other people's chickens/sheep/goats before the rain storms hit.

-Going on mango missions with my brothers and getting sick because we ate so many mangoes.

There so much I have enjoyed doing and while doing I have gained a lot of useful skills. I can write grants, price supplies, conduct interviews in foreign languages. I've collaborated with NGOs and local government bodies. I can do good work in the worst conditions.

I never thought I would be as confident in pulaar as I am now. One of best moments was where I was visiting another volunteer and a man came up to us as we were talking and said my pulaar sounded like Guinea Bissau pulaar. My family is from Guinea Bissau and the fact that I have an accent them which the rest of the village doesn't have was pretty awesome.

However this is not supposed to be post about me finishing my service and going home because I am extending my service another 6 months to be a Peace Corps Volunteer Leader (PCVL) in Kolda. I am really excited about this as it means I will gain even more professional skills since I will be reviewing grants, meeting with people, supervising site set up and developing volunteer resources. I am hoping my french will be fluent by the end since it is very rusty.

The hardest part though will be leaving my village and handing it over to my replacement. When I originally asked to be replaced I wasn't thinking about extending. Now I am and it will be hard leaving and being there while it is someone else's village. I am very excited to be replaced-I've heard great things about the new group that arrived about a week ago. I am sure Medina will have an amazing volunteer. It will just be a little lonely with my crew of 150 people who know where I am, what I am doing and usually why I am doing it.

So sorry I won't be home this year! 2011 folks! I promise to really come back then!

AND PS! I uploaded a ton of pictures to my shutterfly account for those who would like to see some of my projects, village, and my awesome wounds and scars! Take a look! The link is under my photo!

Greetings everyone! I am sorry for the lack of updates over the past 3 months and I promise to try and do better for the rest of my service.

However first of all I must express a sincere and grateful thank you to all the people who donated money to my well project. A few months ago when I was first writing the grant for our garden the biggest obstacle was keeping the overall price of the project low enough so that the community would be able to meet the community contribution requirements- 25% of the total cost, at least 10% in cash, the rest could be met with in-kind contributions like labor and transport. It doesn't sound like much but to a village whose population hovers around 150, with only 13 actual households it turned to be a much bigger concern. So after trimming the garden size and materials to the lowest we could reasonably accept we still had the problem that the village could not come up with the cash. The only thing left we could remove was the well and a garden without a water source is a sorry excuse for a garden.

Then the NGO equivalent of a shining white knight appeared in the form of Appropriate Projects, an initiative of Water Charity. This wonderful offshoot of Water Charity is focused on water sanitation and availability, works with PCVs all over the world, funds projects that are 500 dollars or less and best of all they cut through the red tape and prefund the project with the terms that the project is ready to begin and can be completed in a month. It was if the Fates of Developing Countries felt our despair with the unreliable and frequently late funding problems and gave us a break (and actually Appropriate Projects is directed by a former PCV who got fed up with the red tape that prevented her from getting projects done- one way to fix a problem faced by volunteers all over the world!)

After getting approval from Appropriaten Projects, I removed the well from the garden grant and we could thankfully meet the community contribution requirements which meant I could submit the garden grant. We began construction on the well at the end of February. The village men came out to the area and measured out the land and then the masons (who gaves the BEST deal for the labor-seriously like took a significant reduction in payment, one that no one else would have ever taken) outlined the well area. I bought a pick axe for the masons as a symbol of my gratitude and so afterwords each man in the village took a turn breaking the earth with the pick axe and saying a blessing over the well to make it clean and successful. By the end one man commented that it is the most blessed well in the whole village and that water from this well will taste better than any other well. By the second day the masons hit water and a few of the boys jumped into the well to take the first celeboratory sips and proclaimed it to be the better than any of the other wells.

To the people who donated to the well project you not only gave my village another source of clean water but you also enabled us to to apply and receieve a grant for our garden which will help the village develop food security and increase nutrition. In the single act of giving you have had a multifaceted effect on the lives of Medina Abdoul. A jaraama (Thank you.)

For people interested in helping more PCVs please go to www.appropriateprojects.org It is a great organization that is truly making a difference for volunteers and their communites. You can also see other projects in Senegal (as Senegal currently has the most projects being funded-GO PC SENEGAL!)

In terms of the garden project I received the funds and have purchased all the materials. The village has prepared the land and the goal is to have the project complete by the end of March, si Allah Jaabi (if God wills it). I'm really excited to get it done and start garden trainings for the rains.

We also picked a new place to the tree pepineres in the village. Mainly not in my backyard since that means we have to carry water through my house and our well is the most used well in the area and it is prone to getting a little dry toward the end of dry season. The village All-Star Demba offered up his small gardening space next to his much less used well. He put up the fencing and even filled the first 300 tree sacs. This is a man who would suceed in America. He works so hard, the village respects him (they even wanted him to be Chief but he politely declined insisting on giving the Chief's son a chance to prove himself first), and NGOs trust him. One NGO gave him a real bee hives and a very torn, but real bee suit. The hives are in working order now, I even got stung for walking too close to the hive (did you know bee stings can itch because I didn't) and Demba gave me a sample of his first honey batch. The only thing that worries me is he says he has so many friends and family he never, in good conscience, sell his honey because he could never charge a friend. He much rather give to everyone than have anyone pay. Still working on how we can compromise on that sweet but economically unhelpful stand point.

I am also doing the site set up for a new volunteer in the arrondissment center, about 15KM down the road. It will be an Environmental Education volunteer and if I may say, their site is going to be baller. Like amazing. Great family and motivated schools. Can't ask for much more than that!

This new volunteer will arrive in a week or two and after they get here I will officially be a 'senior' and be entering the home stretch of my service, the last 6-7 months I will be a volunteer. Its strange to think that I have been in Africa for the past year and half. In many ways I am so used to everything here that thought a different routine in America is kind of alien, maybe even a little scary. Probably more scary because when I get back I have to actually get my plans for future in order. After making the choice to come here I didn't think any things else would be as challenging.

I hope everything is well in America! I greet everyone!

The moment that I knew would come and didn't really expect finally showed up last night after dark just before dinner

Its night fall and there is very little light from the moon. I have my trusty headlamp which is on its last two AAA batteries and I have trying desperately to keep my head from exploding. I have been sick since last week and it is resulted in a constant fever, body aches and one giant headache. So I have been drinking lots of water and just before dinner I go to my room to grab some water.

Since the end of the wet season I have had frogs EVERYWHERE. Literally dozens of them at all hours of the night in ever corner of my room. I don't mind this anymore because a)their small and b) I am going to kill of them later when they get in my pepinere so I figure karma is coming why rush.

I bend down to my water container and suddenly I realize that the thing that it is twelve inches from my face is not a frog, but a wriggling, scaly reptile of a length that I didn't stay to find out. After going a whole year without having a snake in my room (seeing them everywhere else) it finally found a way in-thru my open back door.

I ran to my front door and yell

"Mbodi Mbodi!! Mbodi inder suundu-am!" ("Snake! SNake! Snake in my room!)Usually people have a hard time figuring if I am saying snake or mosquito but since I am not prone to yell and wave my arms about the insect variety, my 3 brothers, 2 male village friends, host father and uncle all show up in record time all carrying clubs but not machetes which at the moment I thought was ridiculuous because this is an excellent moment for a machete.

"Adama where is it?" My brother asks. I gave him my head lamp and then gave my room a bigger berth in case the snake was faster that 6 Senegalese men.

"The canari." I said using the wolof term for the clay pot for storing water.

"What? Where?" Finally I used the pulaar word for the pot and they found it.

Unfortunately because I am not very wise near the canari is not only my water filter, water bucket, and gas stove but also several empty bottles of bleach and one glass bottle for storing peanut butter. Excellent hiding place for a reptile.

I let the experts handle it and all I hear and see are murmurs and shadows coming to gether and then shouts as they collectively jump backwards. I hear glass break and know there goes my jar. Oh well.

Finally someone smashes its head and they bring it outside. Its only about a meter long but its body is still wriggling even though its head is mostly flat.

"Touch it Adama!'

Thank you boys I will pass.

However then they quickly dig a whole in front of my room drop the wiggling snake into the hole, cover it up and pour water on- apparently this will keep the snake from coming back. At this point I'll just shut my door all the time.

My brother Buena came up to me and was like "Adama you had cobra, if that spits at you, you will go blind! Don't go near them and shut your door at night!"

Thank you Captain Obvious.

There you have it folks.

I have had:

Goats

Sheep

Chickens

cockroaches

Spider Crabs

Scorpions

frogs

One monitor lizard that lived in my duche area for a few hours

And finally one cobra.

I draw the line at monkeys. No monkeys. If I have monkeys in my room you will be hearing the story from me in person because I will be at home. Monkeys are serious business and I am not monkeying around. (couldn't resist sorry.)

I also came into today to charge my phone (sorry mom my phone is lame and died) and I managed to find the one Alhum that wanted to road race another alhum. These are cars that are piled so high with crap that they lean like their going to tip over and they are going as fast as their duct tape, u-haul, brake-less, gear-less, spit and prayers machines will go. Nearly died.

Then I go to Kolda and I get off, head straight for the bean ladies because after life flashes before your eyes in Africa you want the best possible meal which in the morning is a bean sandwich and a cup of kinkilibob. However as I was walking I was stopped by the sight of something I hadn't seen in Kolda. I mean I had seen it on the road but never IN Kolda.

Four huge trucks filled Senegalese military. The last two cars have people with rocket launchers. I've only seen those in Museums and on GI Joe. They are not very big for the amount of destruction they can cause.

Following of this was a tank, a real live tank. That sounds stupid but I don't think I have ever seen one that wasn't in a Museum. Completely operational there is clearly someone driving it and then the person on top with the walkie talkie who is chatting up and watching the street life. It just blue my mind.

As volunteers we get pretty desensitized to the fact we live in a third world country. Its a coping mechanism really because it would be depressing to remembering this all the time. You get used to the limited diet, the threadbare clothes (because your clothes are threadbare too), and the generally unreliablility of technology and the unreasonable social norms that exist. Then stuff happens and you realize Yep I am in Africa.

Scary stuff like military strikes and high concentrations of gendarmie. Dengue fever outbreaks. Malaria within your family. Car hits you. Snakes in your room.

A swarm of ants invades your hut and covers the floor so you can't see it. (DO NOT MESS WITH ANTS)-this happened to a volunteer recently near my site.

Sad stuff like babies dying, people not being able to afford medicine or treating themselves with stuff that isn't medicine so they end up making themselves sicker. Girls who get pregnant and then drink poison (that their MOTHER gives them) to kill their babies so they can live without the stigma of loose woman but end up killing themselves.

Angry stuff like teachers refusing to teach or politicians not doing their jobs.

It all builds up and we need to cope so we integrate and then any of the above happen and remind us that there is a reality year- life sucks a lot.

Just another a day in Africa. There is no shortage of need for change.

Alright folks, I apologize for the delay in updating my blog since my return from America (sigh.) I have been trying to be in village and get stuff done and it is just so easy to get sucked into the internet and enjoy youtube and facebook. I am never going to get over the addiction of wasting my own time. So sorry I am trying much harder now to be focused. So lets start on America.

It was great. I had 6 pints of ben and jerry's ice cream, 3 quarts of beyers ice cream, 5 reeses klondike bars and a package of popsicles. This was within 17 days. Digestion was a problem that I accepted in the face that I was going to go with readily available ice cream for another year. It was totally worth it.

I also attended the wedding of the year-it was easily one of the most important and beautiful events I have ever had the pleasure to belong to. The dress fit the bride who was the most gracious and prepared bride ever, the groom was calm, the father told hilarious jokes about how the groom won the bride's mom over, and the dancing was off the chart because we pulled out moves that had no names. YOu can measure how great a party was by how sore you are the next day-I've been biking all over my region for the last year and I was sore the next day. Bravo and best wishes to Kelsey and Kevin!

Seeing family and friends and hearing how their lives had changed in the past year was a reality check for me. Time moves so slowly and is so centered on the immediate day to day occurances its weird to know that the lives I used to be so aware of are rapidly changingin my absence.

So enough on that. I made it back to Senegal alright though I arrived in New York just in time to hand my boarding pass to the attendent and walk down the aisle way before they shut the door. That would have been an interesting call to the country director-sorry won't be back til I can get enough money for a plane ticket to Senegal.

I arrived back in Senegal in time for Korite-the day when Ramadan ends and the masses can eat tons of glorious food and ton be insane and starving from sun up to sun down. It trapped me in Dakar for two more days (that and I left my Peace Corps ID in America and I didn't want to be getting out of the car in the Gambia to argue with a border person about why I shouldn't pay to have my passport stamped) but then it was a quick ride back to Kolda and two days later I was back in village.

When I got back everything I owned, patrially owned and wanted to own was covered in mold. My hut smelled like a basement and everything was stiff with mildew and moldy fuzz. However two days of laundry and keeping the doors open cleared everything up and now I am back to my naturally dirty and aromatic self.

Coming back to village I was relieved to find my language had not regressed significantly and that my village still loved me, though a few people confided in me their doubt that I would actually return to Africa after going to the land of ice cream and Mcgriddles (everything I have wanted to eat for breakfast in one bite.) The corn harvest has come in and peanuts are starting to be pulled from the fields to dry. Whenever I walk past a field someone uproots a plant and just hands it to me to eat. Didn't like it at first but as my body began to remember how limited my diet is food I didn't want to eat started to taste much better.

Like for breakfast. All of cows weaned their calves just before I left so every morning all we had was rice and mashed up okra. Not ideal when you want to be working. Well I got back and we didn't even have okra anymore. We had rice with a jumbo cube sprinkled on it. You want to know what jumbo is- you know that little packet inside ramen noodles for spicing the noodles? Thats a jumbo cube. When you have that for breakfast, you are hungry again by 10 and lunch is not till 2pm. I was very unhappy. One morning I got up with the intention of biking to Dabo and I had a banana saved from the night before. When you eat a limited diet and then you have something nutritous you can literally feel it enter your stomach and be dissolved and spread throughout your body as fast as it can. It is a weird sensation.

Fortunately three days ago one of the cows gave birth so now we have milk and breafast is still rice but its rice and kosam and the protein and calcium from the kosam make all the difference.

The first day we had it was actually the day my boss for Peace Corps came to do a site visit and help me complete my community interview and cost analysis for project priorities.

But first let me tell me you about the drama just before he came, because the two days before my boss came I was convinced I had malaria.

All volunteers are on prophalxis for malaria (and I take mine religiously once a week) but the virus does have potential to overload your system and that it was I thought it had done. It started with low grade fevers and body aches when then turned into chills where I was wrapped in my blankets, blowing on my hands and shivering uncontrollably-all this around noon and it was about 90-95 degrees. Not promising considering I also had a fever around 102. After waiting 6 months for my boss to come I couldn't consider risking not being in village for site visit. So I sucked it up, said to myself "Make it to sunday," and took some strong Ibu Profen.

No worries though I made it and I am pretty sure I don't have malaria now. Yay!

The meeting was amazing though. I had been getting people pysched for the past 3 weeks and I even caved and bought a goat for lunch,

We discussed our prevous priorities and began to price the projects. We discussed a pounding machine, a health hut, community garden, chicken coop project, fixing the school, and increasing the cashew orchard. The most expensive project is the pounding machine which everyone said is the priority. The village has to raise 25% of the cost which is around 500,000 CFA and then a matching donor will raise the other 75%.

The women are totally on board with this as this will significantly reduce their workload. I also am a little more confident in them to put forth their share of the money.

Its the men I am worried about. They are interested and want to do the project but they have a slightly less clean record when it comes to paying up when the time is up. We'll have to establish a payment schedule before I can submit anything but I am cautiously optimistic. Plus we priced out the school and I believe without a doubt it can be fixed within this year. It would cost around 400 American dollars to fix it which is doable considering other projects NGOs undertake.

I am very optimistic so far about where projects are going this year.

Other than that I am doing a small event for halloween with the kids and the crayons my grandma's church gave! Very excited for that and that fact the pumpkins are finally in season so I can have eat budu to my little heart's content.

So everyone I am still alive and working in Africa. I am very excited to see where the next 12 months take me.

En Lawwol Gonngal!

Wow I haven't updated in almost two months...I'm sorry everyone for the lack of updates. I will try and describe life as concretely and concisely as I can.

The week of hell ended, in a not hellish way. The nets got out and all five villages were finished with in two days of the last distribution.

Since then I have been trying to figure out what to do with my life after I get back because, the cost analysis for my PACA will be right after I get back from America and so basically I get off the plane and start grant writing. Its exciting to know that I am going to be baller busy my last year but also I am afraid I am not going to get all of it finished.

The community garden is something that the community can benefit from and as been on the to-do list for a few years now.

Ooh but cool story that follows the same line of thought.

I have also been hounding Eaux Foret (natural resources dept) for trees because in the month of August they give out trees for free. Unfortunately they make this as difficult as possible for citizens and volunteers by a) not showing up to work b) claiming to be to busy to STAMP a demand c) deciding to hoard trees until an NGO comes along as pays for them at the hefty price of 500CFA per tree (thats one dollar a tree!) This is even worse because they have these great live fencing species that we want to use in village and they won't give them to us. However because I am a woman and in the city, officials love to talk to foreign women and give them what they want I managed to get some trees for my village. I seriously feel very bad for male volunteers who do amazing work and then get nothing but harassment from officials. The city is where my gender works to my advantage. Not so in village (if one more person asks me to go to the rice field I will chase someone with a machete.) Anyways I talked/flirted my way into some trees and then came to a conundrum. My site is 40K out from Kolda and I can't really charet (horse drawn cart) or alhum them out. I needed a car. Eaux Foret obviously can't spare a nice car, the inspectors office can't until the director comes back and the secretary of the NGO that said they would loan me a car doesn't like to show up to work so I can find the car. This left me calling various friends and biking all over Kolda basically truck stalking.

Things were looking bleak when I started noticing the World Vision truck was appearing on every corner (I heard they were all on vacation for the month of August). After the fourth or fifth time I decided, well heck if they are just trying the car around for kicks and giggles then they can surely spare a the car to take trees out to a village. So I followed the car back to its office (can I put I gained exceptional stalking skills while in the Peace Corps?) and I got out and asked them and they were like "sure, and you don't have to pay for gas'

ALHUMDILAH!

Then it got better. I went back in the afternoon to get the car and was prepared to sit and wait when this nice man introduced himself to me. He said his name and nearly fell down. He was the project manager for all of Kolda, the man I have been told I need to speak to about getting the school in my village fixed.

It was one of those days where everything falls into place because then after listening to me talk he was like "well lets pack up I will take you right now."

We even grabbed the sponsorship coordinator and went to Eaux Foret. I was a little mortified that I needed them to help load up all 600 trees but they took in all in stride when a more patron person would have sat in the car.

Got out to site, kids unloaded the car while then WV people talked with the villagers and then I decided it was now or never.

"Ano faala larde lekkol amen? Mi haalni maa lekkol o ko yakkiima e si a hebori enen mbaawi yahde toon jooni e yiide dum." You want to see our school. I told you it was destroyed and if you have time we can go there now and see it.

Got him out there saw where the roof was caved in, the cement was broken, doors wouldn't lock, and water damage. It was quick but he has SEEN it which means its not just me talking when I go and talk to him again about fixing the school.

Anyways It was an amazing day. I felt like there was hope in my service accomplishing some of the goals I set for myself.

Also I have been outplanting trees like nuts. And a strange thing shas happened to me. People have started giving me chickens. Now chickens are expensive and I try to be clear that all my services are free but as of now I am the proud (?) owner of three chickens named Pizza, Nuggets, and Sushi.

Oh I am out planting because the rains have come. We were and still are concerned there won't be enough rain for a bountiful harvest but they have become more consistent. As long as the season goes longer I think we will be in luck.

But dude when it storms, it friggin storms.

My head lamp broke and so now it doesn't stay on the head band and it only turns on occasionally. When I woke up last week and the wind was so loud I was sure a tornado was about to land on me my flashlight was the one thing I wanted to work. It didn't for like five minutes.

When the wind blows it sounds like a train that is about to run you over. The first few storms we had I would wake up and think I was dreaming of home and wonder why the train was so loud and then realize crap gotta close the doors.

But last week was the worst. I barely got the doors shut in time and then it just howled. I thought my doors were going to blow off (if not at least my roof-thatch hut not so reassuring when the hand of God closes upon you) and papers and clothes fell all around my room.

At one point I tried calling home just to have someone to talk to (site mate is gone in america) but reseau obviously doesn't work in a storm. Thought about crawling under the bed, just in case, but I didn't want to tempt the scorpions underneath it all.

Finally I passed in to restless sleep but it was without a doubt one of those moments where you just think, 'Do i really need to experience this? The weather channel was fine and I got to eat popcorn when the house blew away."

Damage was minimal but I believe the rains only increased the stress on my duche (the toilet) which I have put my foot through not once, not twice but now three times. The day it caves in while I am squatting (and it is coming) I am ETing. I think that is a legitimate excuse-landing in a pit of your own poop can be pretty devestating.

Lastly and most important to announce is that my life is abruptly changing in 13 days. You want to know why?

America. The magic word that is music to every volunteer's ear. I love Senegal (80% of the time) and I am deeply involved in my service and greatly indebted to this experience and that changes it has made to me, but that doesn't mean I don't miss home.

Sometimes it isn't even the amenities that get to me. Sure ice cream, coffee, and laundry machine are great but then a cool, wet wind blows and all I can think of is fall in Michigan. Or how the way the grasses sound in the morning and the birds chirping and buzzing everywhere is so similar to a summer morning at home. Especially with the rainy season I am reminded of fall and spring more and more in scents and textures.

And now that I am going home and also reaching the year mark for my service I am also considering my future after Peace Corps which is not that far away. This experience has changed me, for the most part, for better but I am also afraid that it has further developed a condition I just realize I have. Not physically but mentally.

I am afraid this will only encourage the rootless feelings I have, to go to places I have only read about or seen postcards on, and that the feeling will never abate. I recognize that this actually really normal but some of the things I want (or think I want) require a less mobile way of life. I have loads of time to think about but then I also have none-the decisions I make today, tomorrow, in a year effect how I live my life and I shouldn't waste a single minute not doing something I love and want to do. The problem comes with that conflicts with other desires as well. Oh well. Sorry

Love to all! I will see you all in America soon!

Wow I have been a busy bee the past few weeks. I think June just needed to appear in order for like concrete must happen events to occur. Some of you know that I was expecting to lose my mind and need a stiff drink at the end of it all but its has been ok, if not exciting (though I would still like that stiff drink- if anything to help me brace brace myself for the rains)

Before anything Please note that I added two links under important links. They are links to two of my neighbors/lifelines/friends, Woppa and Naamo, and they have some cool pictures and stories to tell which will help give you an idea of the diversity in lifestyle we PCVs have here. Not to mention they are just some crazy cool girls who you should know. And Naamo has a sweet video on youtube with Tam Tam circles and Akon music. Watch it and marvel. These people dance furiously and fearlessly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkELWJ8bOPw

In other news, the scholarship process for the high school girls is mostly complete, the only thing left is my recommendation for each girl. Doing this scholarship has been pretty stressful at times, due to travel (10-15K just to go to the school) and my lack of experience , but overall I feel like this was an really good project for me to undertake. We (myself and Woppa or Mariama) went to the houses to do home interviews and I think that really brought into focus how important this scholarship could be for some for some of these girls. One girl lives with some cousins, in a two hut compuond with basically stick and mud huts. Talking to her she was really quiet and when we asked the all important question "If you get married will you continue school or will you quit school?" she said she would have to quit. When I asked who told her that, she said her mother. This girl is ranked in the top 15 for the entire college and she would have to quit school. And to not have your mother's support...in this country I would have a hard time being motivated if it was only me pushing. Just seeing these girls and talking with the families, telling them how their daughters were chosen by the school because they're smart and we want to help them to continue their education, that they are were selected out of all the girls because they are special, made me feel like I could actually have an impact on someone's life.

Being an Agroforestry agent, the work that I do for my primary project, is almost always long term, you're not going to see results until the treed reachmaturity (5 years) and thats if they survive the crazy weather and livestock. Recognizing these girls, which is huge because they come from large families and girls don't typically get recognized till they are getting hitched, and potentially giving them the opportunity to get money for school materials and supplies (saving their family the price tag) I could help someone this year be in school and help encourage her family to support her through her educational career. It felt really good.

In my village news, I did a PACA ( the true acronyms escape me but it is community analysis of needs and projects.) It was super stressful but I am glad I did it. I was so worried that I was not going to get whole thing done right, the villagers were going to not get it or drive me up the wall but it all eneded up ok. I had 6 other volunteers show up which helped convince the village, that Adama was serious tigi tigi (really really). We discussed what the village had (a school, storage building etc) and what they are doing during the year followed by needs and wants. I and another volunteer Eljuma worked with the men while two other volunteer, Aliou and Ibrihima took the women. Now these are all volunteers who have been here for almost two years (in fact they are all leaving this fall, sad face) and they have mad pulaar skills. I was pretty proud of my pulaar but this day was truly humbling for me especially when one of the more out spoken men in my village told me to tell Eljuma what I wanted to say and then have Eljuma say it because they could understand him. Massive blow to the ego.

However it went well (thank god the older volunteers were there otherwise I would have been screwed in terms of man power and crowd control.) Got some priorities down so now when my APCD comes to visit he can name prices for village contribution which is the most important part because I want and need my village to understand that any project we do they must contribute to the it which I feel like they have trouble grasping that concept.

I had also had the best day of life since coming to Senegal recently (followed by the week of hell.)

After the the PACA I went to Kolda and the following day I was heading out to Naamo's site to sit in on a health relais training (i.e. make sure people showed up and learned stuff.)

I went to the garage and I only wanted to be taken 20K out which reasonalbly demands a lower price. The driver would not budge. He wanted me to pay a mille for me and my bike. Thats like two dollars in America which shouldn't have been a problem but it was pushed me to the edge. He wouldn't even bargain with me and I was speaking pulaar. So I told him I would bike there before I would pay him.

It was about respect. I can bargain and he clearly ignored it. So I left and started on my bike for Bagadajii. After I got about 5K out I realized I was stupid. It was about ten AM and it was getting to be really hot, somewhere in the humid hundreds. I was going to be dehydrated and tired and after Bagadajii I was going to have to go another 40K. Not the most brillant move but I was stuck with my fate. Then the Fates of Africa stepped aside and gave me a break.

A cement hauler owned by a friend of Woppa pulled up beside me, recognized me, and gave me a ride (for FREE a PCVs favorite) to Bagadajii. Got there finished my business and went to my road town.

As I got there, the Alhum that refused to lower their price pulled up, the apprendes (who are usually good people who must drive a hard bargain) were smiling and waving, saying " A yotiima!" (You arrived!)

Who was I to explain my fortune to them?

"Haa! Mi waddi velo-um gila Kolda ha do!" "Yes I did my bike since Kolda until here!" Then I added some flourishes as I passed the driver, something about an ugly monkey.

Then Karma stepped back in and I dropped my phone on the road as yet another car pulled up and offered to give me a free ride to Dabo. My phone is my lifeline. I have every number I need for work, family, Peace Corps, you name it is in there. I also busted my watch band so it is my time reminder. Several expletives came out of my mouth and while hyperventilating I got the drivers to back up and let me off so I could go back and find. There were so nice and tried helping me find it but no luck. I was going to have to go back and retrace ever step. I could not leave without locating the phone.

Then I got lucky again. I found it. On the road, without being crushed, or broken or stolen. I must have been really good in a past life because almost ten minutes later another car pulls up and offers to give me a ride using the magical four letter word-free.

At first I was like oh take me to Dabo but then as I talked to the passengers I realized that they were going to village I was (which was 20K off the road from Dabo).

At this point I was convinced A) I was having a melfloquine hallucination B) I was dehydrated and hallucinated C) all of the above.

But then it happen I got free rides all the way to the village I need to be-thats 50K worth of free rides-I only rode my bike for 10k. Best day of my life.

Then of course it could only go one direction-down.

Which will be another post because it is a long long week. And it is not yet over.

Hey folks. Life is busy but this past week work has changed up a bit. And it has been a messy ride-literally and figuratively.

It started Sunday morning when I went to the road town and found that the health relais who was supposed to do net counts with me got called to the Post de Sante (the big, but not big health post that serves as a head quarters for all the health huts and a care center for the rural population). Normally I would have been fine with this but this conflicted with the SCHEDULE, which has become life and the only way I can keep track of everything. This was the last village I needed to count and it was also the largest. At least 50 compounds which translated into atleast 500 people. I already did basic counts but I needed names and gender statistics and I did not want to do it by myself. However it needed to get done because month of June I have booked with no room for the delays another day of counting would bring (it didn't help that we had planned to do this earlier and I changed the date to accomadate him.)

Anyways got mad sat under a grass overhang and moped over how crappy it was going to be to count those nets all by myself. It took 6 hours to us to the other big town, together! I was going to be there all day.

So finally I went to the chief's compound, got the numbers for four houses and then as I listened to the kids who had been sent with me to guide me in this town I decided 'Hell with this! I'll move something around I cannot and will not do this by myself!'

Went back and chilled out in my village, (did I mention the day before I had done 40K of trail riding, again nearly gotten sick from dehydration, and I was sore as all get out?) and got a call from the relais.

"No problem Adama we will do it this evening!!'

Problem 1) I wanted to go Kolda so I could prepare to to go to Thies for the SENEGAD conference.

Problem2 2) I was still mad that it hadn't been done in the morning and now I would have to potentially miss the ride into Kolda and ride my bike out there again in the hot weather.)

Eventually I sucked it up. We did it (4 hours!) and I still missed all the cars but at least it was done! Had to go back to village inthe dark (head lamp died-speaking of which the power surges fried my battery charger. If anyone can send me some AAA batteries or a charger, old, new, whatever, I would be thankful. A volunteer without a head lamp is a volunteer who squats over a scorpion. No one wants that.)

Anyways got into Kolda the next morning. Here is something tha has happened to my body that is good and bad. I can eat village food for the most part with no problem now. Repitition is tedious but its good and consistent and my stomach knows it.

The bad part is when I go to Kolda I get sick because I eat food I don't normally eat. And this was the case. Naseua, light headedness, and fever, followed by vomitting. All before I need to get in a car at 3AM to go to Thies. ANd for those of who don't remember my motion sickness here is on an epic level. I need to be unconscious for these rides. I thought about not going but I really wanted to learn more about SENEGAD, see what projects they fund and give feed back on Kolda.

PLus my change purse disappeared on the alhum, along with 4 mille and my peace corps ID. And I got sent the wrong malaria medication. That pretty much sealed my fate. Got into the car (got a window seat-no one wants me to puke on them.) Passed out till Gambia where for the first border crossing miraculously I was not asked to pay showing my pass port, a favorite pass time of the border people who KNOW that PCVs do not pay to enter and leave the country.

Unfortunately I was super sick at this point and just wanted to make it to an area not populated by people who try to speak english so I could vomit.

Made it to Senegal before I had to urge the driver, in my poor poor french, to stop the car. Botta and I (another volunteer) made it Thies where we a) stopped and got food (even I needed to eat something) and then got to the center and passed out for 15 hours straight. Didn't even put sheets on the bed. Hard core, still covered in a layer of red earth, shoes on, blissful sleep.

The meeting went pretty well. I think we are going to be doing a lot of projects this year and hopefully integrate more men (Senegalese and male volunteers) into gender development.

Its the after part that was really the big adventure.

I went to my homestay village to greet my sister who recently had her wedding (the guy is still in Spain but he is arriving mid-June I guess. Hope he isn't a jerk.) Got out there by myself (or at least as by myself as I could get asking everyone with in ear shot or within my cell phone if I was going the right way) met up with the family. They are amazing. I was so lucky to have them. But anyways the big debate was this-How was i getting to Dakar tomorrow?

My family wanted me to go out there, and come back and then they would send someone to the Garage with me to make sure I got on a good car. Sounded fabulous to me but too much car, i.e. to much vomit potential. So I convinced them (and myself) that I would get to Dakar in the morning, by myself, find the Peace Corps office (which I have only been to twice-during PST and on swear in) and then I would stay at the office until midnight when I would catch the midnight car to Kolda. My reasoning was this. I want to travel in Africa, and I will probably do some of it myself which meant it was better to learn now rather later how to do it.

My mother looked at me like I was saying I was going to walk myself back to America. She is so wise. However she gave my the benefit of the doubt. And then sent one of the cousins with me to garage so that he would find someone on the alhum who was heading in my direction who then would be trusted to see I got there.

Good intentions but the Fates of Africa prevail.

The alhum broke down and so w had to get off. I got into conversation with some Pulaar du Nords who sent me in the direction of the big city buses. "it will stop at the garage.' They said

Got on, near the front. The bus took off. Ok I thought thats not too bad. Only a hundred CFA (like 25 cents) to go another 50K. Thought I was getting a deal.

Then as the naseua started building and Dakar popped I realized something about this bus.

It was making stops. Not like hitchhiker stops but like actual scheduled stops. It was the SMART bus of Senegal! It wasn't going to the garage! It was making rounds!

Now I am freaking out a little. I start askling who understands pulaar.

Zero.

So I start asking in rudimentary french. No one understands with my atrocious accent and infantile grammar. At this point we are in the city and I comforted by the fact that the road is nice (there were nice roads by the office right?) but still started to believe I could be legitimately lost in this city.

Someone told me that the bus was eventually heading in the direction of Ngor but that doesn't mean anything. Direction could be within 5K or 20K. So I realize my options are down to this. Call another volunteer. Or. Call the Peace Corps.

I debated over this for a moment. Do I want another volunteer to think I am an idiot and then try to give me directions even though I doubt they know where I am or what landmarks I am passing? Or do I call Peace Corps and have the comfort of knowing they know Dakar and still have them think I am an idiot.

Chose Peace Corps.

Our security coordinator was the one I called (hey if I am lost I am not secure!) and bless his soul he didn't call me an idiot but said make sure the bus is heading toward the airport. Did that and then another nice man (seriously for ever pick pocket and toubaub hating jerk in this country there are at least 3 more good samaritans) said he was going to Ngor and would take me there. We get off the boss and he negotiates a taxi for us and we get in. About 20 minutes later Id ecide to call the security cooridinator again. I know we are in Ngor, I just don't know where the office is. I figure he can talk in wolof to the man and we will get there in a flash.20 minutes later we are pulled over and he is still talking.

I'm thinking there is no way we are THAT lost. I know we are close. I can practically smell the air conditioning.

Two minutes later and another mille more we are at the office jsut in time to get in before the office closes. I thank the man profusely and I want to give him money for the cab so he can get where he is going. He just waves it off. Who in America would get in a car with a foreigner who barely speaks english and see them to where they need to be and then not ask for anything in return? I finally give him my phone number so if he ever needs a volunteer he can call me up.

So now I am chilling. I made it to the office. The next hurdle is making it to te garage and then to Kolda. Lets hope it is less than 15 hours and vomit free.

Sorry folks about the radio silence. Life had suddenly gotten significantly busier for me which is good, no great, compared to the alternative. I have been a busy busy bee the past month.

I distributed roughly 4000 tree sacs and all but 300 have been filled by the person who ordered them! Also my limes sprouted which makes my day! Citrus is so difficult to grow and to have almost all of my sacs sprout is thrilling (outplanting and later battles with pests and sheep will be another story but let me bask in my happy glow.)

Myself and another volunteer have begun the scholarship process in the high school and the school has been extremely cooperative and motivated to give us information and time with the girls, especially since they have finals going on. The scholarship is the Michelle Sylvester Scholarship, which goes to the top 80 girls enrolled in high school for the entire country! There are so many qualified girls which makes the process (though labor intensive) that much more fulfilling. For those of you who want more information you can get info at the website: www.senegad.org

You can also watch Elle Travaille, Elle Vit, a Peace Corps Volunteer production which has been shown to audiences all over Western Africa to encourage discussion and consideration of gender development. It is on youtube.com, just type in the title.

Also we finally got our nets for distribution so I have been finalizing net counts and securing malaria data for comparison next year. Our community is distributing 1000 nets this rainy season!

We also just did our Regional Strategy meeting for Kolda which should help us develop goals that correspond to the Millenium Development Goals and help pinpoint areas where we can cross collaborate and develop projects. Its intense but I think it will actually be useful.

Other than that I have been biking like a mad girl (which now that is regularly 110 degrees at least, I think it is correct in saying my brain is cooking all of the common sense out of head). In the last week I logged over 100K on my bike (mostly through back and forth rides to Dabo, one two long rides out to villages that umber 30k in round trip mileage). I think I have calluses on my butt. My relationship with my bike is a love-hate-but mostly love relationship. It allows me to get my work done and without I would be limited to a terrifying degree. I ride it so much that I have busted it 3 times in the last two months. I ruined a thorn proof inter-tube, loosened the back axel, wore threw the back brakes, and stripped two screws on the back tire. I am trying alot harder to be careful but man I will know how to fix my bike. I can change the tire, tighten brakes, and take apart the back tire. Little things I did not know that I know now because if I don't I would be screwed in the case something happens when I am out by myself in the bush. Dehydration is no joke and there have been a few moments where I didn't pay attention to my body and have gone into this stupor where I don't sweat, feel super lethargic and have trouble standing upright. Gotta be my own doctor here.

So everyone please be safe in America! Do not get swine flu! Wash your hands!!

And also I think I should mention this because it thrills the heck out of me, one of my best friends, the marvelous, talented, over motivated Colleen has been accepted into Peace Corps Mali and will be flying out to West Africa in July! We're practically neighbors! (seperated by a rather shady border and inconsistent transportation.)

Michigan is invading Africa!

The hot season is upon us and now I spend 12-4pm everyday trying to not to move. It is so hot my deordorant and soap melted. My handle bars to my bike melt in my hands! And the worst is yet to come because every villager has said "just you wait Adama, it will be wuli buy in april and may.

I have started sleeping outside on my mat in the backyard. It is too hot to sleep in my hut at night.

I was in village for a really long time during this month. I think the count was 19 days and man at the end of the 19 days I NEEDED to leave. I was coming back from a 30K bike ride to another village on a sunday, where the meeting in said villlage was useless, and on the way back we got caught in a forest fire (nothing like huge, it was just smoke and heat) and upon arrival I hear my villagers arguing about something in the our equivilant of the town meeting hall (under the mango tree.) They (thank god) were arguing about the village garden they want to build and when they finished they presented to me some papers which they had written down what they wanted and what seeds they wanted. I asked them the dimensions of the garden because I wanted to do pricing in Kolda.

It took 45 minutes to explain this. All I could think was I need to get to kolda. I turned to Aliou and was like "can I get a car to Kolda right now?"

'bismillah adama' which means 'hell if I know but allah welcome you. "

So i booked it back stuffed my bag and headed out at about 5:30. I was laughing hysterically as I left my village and talking to myself. My sanity was unraveling.

Then the worst thing possible happened. I did not get a car. Waited until it was dark and then the butik owners came out and were like "adama it is bad to travel at night, you should wait till tomorrow.'

I live 3K off the road but the path is not bikeable in the dark. The fact that I lost my back brakes about 3 weeks ago did not help. I was inconsoble. Walking back to my village when I had hoped to eat a burger, watch a movie and sleep undisturbed for 8 hours was demoralizing. I love my village and my family but I was so upset that I could not sit out with my family. It was sounds extreme but when you have bad days, they can build up and be really bad.

I have more to write but I need to go.

However the true reason for this post is this.

I updated my shutterfly like whoa. So check out my pictures.

AAAAAANNNNND

I bought my plane ticket back to AMERICA 10 minutes ago. August 31st-Sept 17th. Place it in your calenders friends. I am crossing the big pond and there will be ice cream.

I am sorry folks about going dark side for the last few weeks. IST turned out to be a more intensive than I expected and the WAIST was....I will explain waist after this very important message.

I, who has never lost a phone since I got in, lost my phone. Don't know how but I did. I have a new phone now. 77-683-1800. I apologize for this (and trust I am throughly disgusted with myself because I had everyone who I have ever met in Senegel's number in there and now I have zero. Not even my village family's number. I suck!)

Next point. I thought I came to Africa because it was warm. It has been in the 60's here and I have been freezing. I had to go to Fukijay (salvation army senegal style) to get a sweater. It was warmer in kolda than it was in Thies and Dakar. FI HODUM! (WHY!) In 1 month I will regret saying this but I miss being too hot.

IST was pretty good. Originally the plan was to learn wolof but a man from my village when I told him this, he said, don't do it! Learn french, if you want to communicate with the officials.

However got to Thies and some how I got put down for Pulafuta (the pulaar for southeastern Senegal). I have enough trouble with fulakunda and while I passed by test I decided to continue with fulakunda. It was a small class and this time around we learned articles (like 17 of them), better grammer and proverbs. Like these ones

The tail leads the cow-it means something weird is happening.

You ran away from fart and you stepped in poop-the grass isnt always greener on the other side.

Once I get my pulaar book out of my bag I'll post them in pulaar for you.

We did some techical training though I expected more. Went seed collecting and learned that aggressive species here are truely aggressive. Like you cannot touch them with out being in pain. Acacia mellifera-if it were in a motor cycle gang it would be Hell's Angels.

Also did tree grafting. Sharp knife here is completely diferent from sharp knife in America. For one thing I can't cut with 'sharp' knives here. Demba (it is a common name here but this guy is the training manager) is a grafting whiz and I am pretty such could graft a tree by staring at it. I wish we had more practice with grafting because it was cut short but it would have been useful.

I stayed with a new familly. They were used to the volunteer thing and I loved the girls (i never get placed in families with boys. ) even the baby who managed to pee on me.

My little sister Fatou I am pretty sure has some kind of hyperactive disorder because even around 11PM she was bouncing off the walls. I said I was going to bed, she got sassy and said if I did she would stand outside my door and make noise till I got up. Ingenious for a 4 year old.

After IST was WAIST-West African Intrural Softball Tournament.

For the record I still suck at this game. However soccer could not be an option because lets face it drunken soccer is still more dangerous than drunken softball. Volunteers from all over, Guinea, the Gambia, Mauritania, and Mali came and it was a party. There were also ex-patriot teams (embassy, NGO, international students workers) and Senegalese teams.

Kolda and most of Senegal did not care who won. At one point the softball game turned into a kickball game, people were running bases carrying other people on their shoulders, and a kankeran (a mythical creature who sneaks up on children and looks like Harry from 'Harry and the Hendersons') played for us and scored a homerun.

But I think the best part of WAIST was the homstay. We stayed with an international teacer (me and two other girls) and it was like being in the US. We had pancakes and burritoes made from scratch and a maid did our laundry for us with a MACHINE! There was a bath tub and hot water. and a real bed (shared between the three of us but if we really wanted there were three couches).

We went out to dinner last night and got authentic chinese food. I am finding that being part of one international group is that you become aware of one else. Like the chinese restaurant was run by chinese expats and it looked the same as it would in China. And they, for the most part did not speak french, but we hada volunteer with us who spoke a little chinese and was very accepted by the people there.

I feel like hearing someone else speak your language, makes you feel really that much closer to that person. It takes real fluency to be able to express yourself in another language and I can't help but think I will not be able to do that. Hopefully I will but it will take the whole two years.

I have been thinking a lot the past two weeks (two weeks in village can do that to a person) and I realized I should explain some stuff.

Like for instance, some times life really sucks here like a shot of hundred proof lemon vodka. And when it does it is multiplied by the fact that you don't speak the lanaguage fluently (or at least not yet for me) and you nearest neighbor maybe an hour bike ride away in the hot, tire melting sun.

I have had a few of these moments (4 to be exact) where I have been what the heck am I doing here I should go back to Ameria and worry about the laterst Lindsey Lohan crisis . Of course even I know I would be miserable by that which leads to the thinking of that I may not be happy anywhere on this planet. It's a downward spiral, like a vortex, i think that is what it is called.

But what really is driving this is that no matter at the end of the day I am in Africa and not in America and I had an experience recently where it this fact became more pronounced.

It involved me on my bike going to get bread because my wonderful host mom had made beans for breakfast and an Alhum ( i.e. big uhaul with people in it). Thought I was far enough over on the side of the road and it turned out I wasn't when the side mirror slammed into my shoulder.

I cannot even begin to describe the blur of emotion that went through my mind. I stayed on my bike (how I don't know) and came to a shaking stop. My shoulder hurt but I believe I have suffered worst pains, but mostly this sense of bewildering powerlessness came over me as I watched the Alhum continue to barrel down the road.

I turned into a hysterical wreck. A young teenage boy in front of me heard me shout when the car clipped me and turned and came back. Crying is something of taboo here and a foreign white chick weeping uncontrollable was very distressing. He kept asking asking "are you hurt, do you have a phone?' He felt my shoulder, trying to see if it was dislocated and between hyperventilating breaths I said in pulaar I was not hurt and that I was just scared. Then proceeded to weep more.

Finally got myself under control and continued on my way. I needed breads for beans and how was I going to explain that to my family if I came back without bread. Now I can see that I could have easily explained it but I just couldn't comprehend it then.

Made it to the lumop and saw the Alhum that hit me. And proceeded to begin to lose it again.

I was like oh no I cannot cry again at the lumo (first time was after install and I was stressed about all in life) and so I headed to where I thought there was bread, my bean lady. Then heard my name. My american name.

Turns out my site mate had been on the Alhum. What are the chances of that. It must have been the idea that "thank god some one else who I know and trust and can speak english is here) because I just motioned for her to come over and then was wreck again this time in english.

She didn't see me get hit but she heard it. We talked and I calmed down enough to to go over to the bean lady's daughter who thought I was hysterical because the beans hadn't arrived yet.

She saw her brother and I kid you not, shouted at him "Where is mother, this toubaub needs beans now!" I love kids.

I told her I just needed bread and went back without seeing everyone like I normally so because also this day I had guests in the form of Peace Corps arriving soon and I needed to reset my mental balance or call and say Don't Come, I have the plague.

I am ok I was just scared and hit with the reality that the whole truck could have hit me (I wasn't in the middle of the road I was as far off the road as I could get, but drivers and vehicles are truly the biggest threat to volunteer safety through incompetance, broken machinery, or malicious intent) and I could have died. The ambulence doesn't show up in 5 minutes here, it could take an hour. The best hospital in the region is 40K away. The best thing to do, which is exhausting sometimes, is to have constant vigilence.

And eventually I told my family after I nearly broke down at the well later that night (someone asked me if I was goin to the farrow and when I said no, told me I was stupid). My mother was furious and she cried too. My father was furious too. He said all drivers in Senegal have no head, they drink beer and smoke. They are bad people who don't even care about kids on the road, which was another horrifying reality that I could have easily been a child hit by an car, and that I was going to avoid the road whenever possible and that I wasn't going to bike into Kolda anytime soon. Fine with me.

For the record I did bike into Kolda, about two weeks ago. Took me two and half hours to go 40K and only one Alhum passed me the entire time. Infact it was the only car to pass me.

I am glad to say the 75% of the time is great. I love it here, the kids are my best friends, I went and visited 14 villages (2 of which are ten miles into the bush from mine) and asked about problems, previous volunteer work and what I could do to help one I return from IST. I went to school and I have some ideas for possible projects to do there and I talked with my brother about the potential for running a soccer tournment for education. He was like "Adama if you do that I will get every village out here and I will give you my jersey to play." They really love soccer here.

So if yu have soccer ball and pump in America lying around, feel free to send it here. SOccer balls are destroyed in hours if not minutes here.

I also had two french teachers lined up to help me learn french better and my pulaar is consistently expanding (though grammar does not improve.)

Case in point. Came in yesterday and got an Alhum as soon as I got to the road. I was overcharged by 100 CFA for me and my bag but I didn't care. Met up with some great ladies who were all Baldes (my family name) and if I wasn't in Africa it would have been like a a girls night out. I think they were all heading to a party in Kolda. We talked and I told them about me and we joked and said we were all family (some of them actually were related to me and some to my site mate). They said You can speak alot of pulaar!!

Then the apprentice showed up and said he wanted a mille 300 (the agreed amount was a mille, and it should have been 900). I gave him my best stink eye and said no, I want a mille in change back. Handed him the money and fekt the stare of every woman behind me looking at him to say "mess with her, we dare you junior."

I got my mille back. Life rocks like that.

Also I heard Jonas Brothers on the internet and got kind of weepy. Ridiculous yes.

I am heading up to Dakar in the next two days and so I should have rocking internet and reception for three weeks. I come back to Kolda after WAIST (softball...haha.)

Love to all!

I said I would write more at Christmas but alas we lost our internet connection at the house and therefore could not write. Christmas wasn't like Christmas in America but it was pretty darn good. We had some serious whizzes in the kitchen who whipped up duck, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, sweet potato casserole (which actually caught on fire in the stove but we ate it anyways and it was still good!), pumpkin pie, and scalloped potatoes with sausage! And the night before we had stew with rolls made from scratch! It tasted exactly like it does in the US! We devoured it to say the least. Between 12 people we devoured two stew pots. Oh and did I mention someone donated a can of spinach they got from Dakar and made spinach dip. Cloud nine does not begin to describe the extravagenza of tasty delights.

Packages did not come on Christmas nor the day after or the day after that. I was going to wait till monday and then spend the New Year in village (I felt a little guilty since I was away for six days) but then I was told there were going to be a few people in for the holiday. I figured what the heck. The packages probably wouldn't be until after the New Year (or at least not till after I left Kolda) knowing Senegal postal service and I was going stir crazy in the house. Who knew being bombarded by pulaar was so important to my mental health!

So I went to village. It was awesome! Maybe I just needed to be away to recuperate, to refocus and be ready to start again. What was crazy was on my way to the gare routier I ran into two of my villagers, one who was riding the Alhum back to village!! They were like "Adama, we have not seen you, were you in Kolda for the fete?"

So I got back and seeing my family was so wonderful! When I think of how scared and distrustful I was in the beginning, I am that much more thankful that my family was patient with me and didn't press me when I embraced my inner toubaub and retreated into my hut for several hours when I got frustrated. Sure I still have rough moments but I know my family isn't going to give up on me (well most of the time cuz sometimes I deserve what I get.)

Anyways I was busy, busy for three days I was in village! I went to the World Vision and I have decided that is where I am going to go every Monday just to talk with people and get a feel for projects in the area. And some of the people there speak a little english. When I get there they were going over Christmas cards for local kids from sponsors written in English. We talked for a bit, mentioned I needed teacher, and so they said they would help me! Its only once a week for a few hours but it is something! And since they had christmas cards in english, they passed them to me and told me to read in them Pulaar. I could! At little and they helped me with the structure but it was something and when I got back to village some of the kids had them and so I translated what I could. I felt useful! Yay!! Not to mention I have been trying to greet like crazy and the kids don't have school, they are everywhere, so inevitably before I get to ever house there is a rousing game of chase Adama to her room. And I trimmed back my tomatoes (more like gave it a buzz cut) because over half the plant was infected by a virus and I wanted to save what I could. So it kind of looks skeletal but hopefully this will save what is left. I found what was eating the Jaxatu too (curse catipillars!!) One of the villagers is also working on a fish project in the farrow, but since it will be dry by the end of dry season, we'll see what can be done.

One thing that I have noticed is my standard for food hygeine has dropped significantly. You can get frozen bissap juice in bags, and at first I was afraid but now I'm like "its frozen! And tasty!" Of course I'll have three please! Fatayas being sold from a bucket in the market, delicious. Who cares if it had flies on it? Lord if it has beans, the only way I probably won't eat it is if I see something moving in it. Fruit that has fallen on the ground? Don't worry it still has intact skin, but yes I'll eat it.

We had guests over and so we got fish with the rice and leaf sauce (!!!!) and After we were done the men were like "Adama you didn't eat a lot eat more!" All I wanted to say was "Dude I made sure to have a fish ball in each scoopful and I think I consumed more than half of the fish balls in the bowl. I think I am in protein overload and now MUST go lay down."

Don't worry, this type of attitude does have repercussions. And after each one I am little more wary of food but I give into temptation again. and again.

Ohh and now for the wonderful news. Came into Kolda today and after I greeted the post man I became the proud owner of SEVEN packages!! I brought my bike in because I am going to another volunteers village tomorrow and so I had to send them with Jess in a taxi to the regional house! Talk about feeling like a rockstar! Thank you everyone!! Grandma, your cookies were still good and I will get a picture of me in the clothes as soon as I bring my camera in (left it in village-stupid me!). I feel so loved and it makes me want to work that much harder because I have such a marvelous support group in America!! I miss you all very much! Have a happy new year!

My resolutions this year:

1) Run more

2) Be more fearless

3) Learn pulaar

4) Wash clothes at the well-oh wait conquered this one. :) Washed my clothes successfully at the well (with help from my sisters) and now I have CLEAN clothes!! Only had a few gawkers!

Love to all!

Thats one of my favorite Christmas songs and it is playing on the cd player right now. I am in Kolda for holidays and we are eating duck for Christmas dinner (Jess and Nathan dispatched Daisy and Donald earlier this morning) and from what it seems a massive dinner. Tonight I think we are going small to prepare ourselves for the holiday itself but we may get a pig. Some of you know of the vivid dreams of bacon I have but due to the lack of meat regulation I am not supposed to eat pork. But I miss Bacon.

No I have not received packages yet but the post office said maybe today!! Before the end of January for sure (Si Allah Jaabi). Thank you everyone for letters, cards and packages. I cannot express enough how much they help me when I am having a rough day and I can just go into my hut pull out a letter, read it, and remind myself that someone loves me and believes in me and the dammit I can learn Pulaar because I CAN.

I have two people looking for pulaar tutors for me. Iasked around the village but the teachers in village are very busy and no one else has m,uch time available. So I have asked a school administrator in the road town to talk to some people and the world vision repabout 7K away is also looking too.

I am picking up vocab and I use flashcards but I just have the grammar of a child which is frustrating.

Ohh but big news-I got my bed AND the new Peace Corps issued Mosquito net! the bed is not that comfortable but I am off the floor and it actually looks like a bed. The mosquito net actually covers the entire bed (which means I stretch out and when I wake from malaria dreams I'm not tangled in the net-less panic) and it has a flap for easy exit. I feel like I am big pimpin. I also got two more buckets from the market.

My goal for the new year is to get over my fear of the well women and do my laundry next to well where I can easy get fresh water to rinse clothes completely.

I also found the Senegal Natural Resources has some projects going in my community already (like BEES!!) which should help me get experience more projects and what resources are available to me.

I will try and write a more thorough post later but now I get to clean the ducks. Love to all, and most of all Merry Christmas!! Sing some carols for me and call the people you love!

Haven't been on the computer in a while, so sorry for the lack of updating, but I have lots of new stories. I'll try to type as many as a I can.

First I am getting better at names in the village. I can successfully idenitify and correctly name at least 60 percent of the village. Mostly adults but I know so some of the kids! It sounds small but if everyone knows my name its only reasonable that I know the names of everyone in my village-only about 160-170 people, no problem right? I make sure to go around to the village and greet everyone at least once a day and then hang out with a few families for longer. I was being more guarded around the villagers but now I am relaxing. Other volunteers have had poor experiences in village because they were robbed (which I am mostly confident and hopeful that that won't happen to me) or because a few people would harass them for money or medicine. I have gotten really good at saying no. There is always the polite person in me who says I should be more considerate and that I could be perceived as ungenerous but a good number just want to push my buttons and when I say no I get a little respect (Yay!)

I was sick for the first time in village. I am 90% certain that it was food related because I ate out of another family's bowl. It was a kind of scary experience. It started with me feeling woozy and getting really hot after lunch. Then I just layed on my floor and I could not move. Everything hurt and I was hot and then cold. I took my temperature and it was 104 degrees. I was miserable. The only thing I was thinking was I haven't discussed with my family what to do if there is an emergency or if I am very sick, how to get me to Kolda, to Dakar, or who to call. Dinner came and went and I could not eat anything. I had the raging fever the entire night and the next morning it still wasn't down so I made the decision to go to Kolda in case I continued to get worse and for comfort purposes. Being sick in a hut is not fun. Getting to the road was a challenge because I could not walk straight, let alone bike, and I almost left my glasses behind, and so my host father put me on the back of his bike and carried me to the road where we hitch hiked in. It took three days but my fever went away and left only some headaches. I felt like a wimp for not being sick in village but as other volunteers put it, volunteers sometimes feel like they have to rough it or punish themselvesand be sick in village, but it does no one any good and you'll probably get better faster in a quieter, nutritionally diverse environment.

On the topic of good news I hitch hiked in all by myself for the first time!! yay! I only got overcharged by 100 CFA and I found my way from the garage to the regional house! Could I be gaining a sense of direction?

I also decided to stop fighting parents and accept their children when offered. I have named all the boys under 12 my husband. Their parents get a hoot out of it. One poor boy who was my first husband he sees me and he runs away! Who would have thought cooties are all on continents? Also when I left village to come in this time I also felt like I really had people to say good bye to, you know like people who I feel like I am developing friendships with. it was an odd feeling but a good one too.

I also met my host grandmother. She is clearly the matriarch of the family but she is one cool lady who likes to joke with me that she is mad because I have no gift for her and that she will leave and always be mad at me. We had Tabaski (reason for the second half of the post title) and the result was we went to the mosque, we prayed, went back and killed sheep. Everyone knows I have no particularly affection for sheep. In fact my brothers thought it was funny that when I walked past one of the sheep that I kept telling him I was going to eat him on Tabaski. I have pictures of the sheep killing. It was merciful and quick and the skinning and meat preparing was fascinating. We ate meat, like it was going out of style. It was delicious. I went into a food coma. the downside of it was I SAW what went into the "going to eat" pile and I couldn't really identify it after it was cooked. So I ate it and if it was too chewy then I ate less of that. Not going to pass up the opportunity for protein.

Speaking of Protein I will post my wish list for now. I would also like to thank everyone for sending me letters and packages. When the day is rough it is nice to know I can have a hot chocolate or oatmeal or kool aid or peanut butter and pretend I am in America.

So Wish List!

Jerky

Children's Vitamins (flintstones to be given as "candy" when the kids ask for it)

Koolaid

Tuna or chicken breast packets-you know they come in the aluminum like packages, not refrigerated, come in flavors like garlic herb, lemon zest.

Cranberries!

Trail mix

any magazines you may have lying around from fluff to news (Cosmo to Wire to News Paper articles you think I might like!)

Macaroni

pecans

M and Ms! The big bags so I can make cookies!! please. thank you. I also really love the dark chocolate kind but if you can't find it then regular and peanut will be fine. I will eat whatever you send me

Hair condition-Africa doesn't not like my hair

razors

books that you think I will like

Candy

know that anything you send is greatly appreciated and enjoyed!!

Love to all! Enjoy the holiday season!

...Teach my family the chicken dance. That's right folks after letting my family laugh at me for rather jerky-white-girl-can't-dance movements I decided to give them something real to laugh at. complete with motions and obnoxious singing.

So I have been in village for about 3 weeks now but it doesn't feel like it. I feel like I have been there forever. Installation was kind of crazy. I ended going to another volunteer's installation before mine and that was interesting experience which only made me more excited and nervous for my own. It was kind of humorous in that when we both got out of the car they didn't know who was their volunteer even though we look nothing like each other. That is another thing I've noticed is that many of the villagers think all white people look the same even when we are radically different looking. But then again it is taking me a while to differentiate faces which I guess is a weird and interesting conundrum faced by people who don't live in physically heterogeneous societies. Not that America doesn't have diversity but I've never been completely surrounded by black people and my village has really only seen volunteers which they are not a lot of down here and learning to make the appropriate visual adjustments to recognizing people is fascinating to me. I hope I expressed myself right in this paragraph and if I offended anyone I apologize.

The Peace Corps car (with all the African possessions to my name) turned off the paved road and onto this dirt path, my stomach started to get jumpy. The thought did occur to me that I could technically turn around and not even torture myself with the possibilities presented by seeing my village and in as little as two weeks I could be back in America drinking real coffee and reading the Sunday newspaper comics enjoying what was left of fall and the beginning of winter.

However that was far too easy and plus I really wanted to see my hut (cuz everyone knows that could be part of the story I tell for the next two years "I lived in a hut in Africa.)

We pulled up to this small pink concrete building and there were about 50 people standing, sitting, dancing and making music on metal bowls who cheered when they saw us.

Tha was what got me out of the car. I smiled and the trainer and driver (these people have names but I'm not sure if they wish to be associated with my blog so unless I am told otherwise I try to name people) got out with me and we went and started to shake hands, greet people. Lots of "Jaramming" (thanking) going on and then I got I pulled toward the circle of women playing the bowls and dancing. Another volunteer had said the one of the best ways to earn brownie points was to dance and so when the opportunity presented itself I said to myself "it's not like they won't spend the next two years laughing at me anyways" and jumped in.

They laughed and someone through a grand bou bou over me and after sometime we sat and the trainer talked in front of the village telling them why I was here what I was expected to do and then we went to see my hut.

It is is in the back of the village and it is bigger than I expected. I have some space. Unfortunately it was completely bare, lacking most importantly a bed. The doors needed to be recemented and it didn't lock at first and when I stepped in to the backyard (which is huge and when I got there it was buried under weeds) I was greeted by two massive cows and some chickens. I stepped back into my douche which was partly exposed by a leaning fence and faced not so much a hole as a crater. The housing report I got from two years ago mentioned that somethings needed to be recemented and it was obvious they hadn't been done. But whatever even the fence in my backyard was broken giving me a front row view to the douche for the hut next to me.

The well had a bucket and rope so all in all life was looking pretty good.

I was given explicitly instructions that these would be fixed and at the someone else's expense within in the week. They were fixed after two weeks when I said I was heading the regional capital to talk with the Peace Corps staff ( I wasn't going for any reason except the desire for a hamburger and to turn in a site locator form).

I'm most proud of the back yard which still has weeds but I cleared the heck out of it. I mus have put at least three hours of work in for the first week I was there. I had these huge piles of weeds which I was saving as green material for a compost pile but then someone in the village found a two and half meter snake in their room and I decided having giant piles of potentially good looking space for reptiles was not in my best interest. So I threw them over my fence and kept only the most dry straw to act as mulch. I successfully (so far) planted cucumber, beans, carrots, and I have a pepinere for tomatoes, hot peppers, onions and more carrots. I think that may have earned me some cred because when i say that I have a garden I get the are-you-serious look more often than not. So I show them and then they say they can show me their gardens, which considering it is not going to rain until next September are impressive in size. Met the World Vision rep for the village and he has banana trees in his backyard which I intend to figure out how he grows them because in COS report I got the volunteer had a lot of trouble with banana trees. I just want a banana tree. Really bad.

I should also mentions I alternate wearing two pairs of pants, two tank tops and a wrap skirt. I stopped wearing deodorant and I am very dirty most of the time but I think for the most part my smell isn't bad yet. Or maybe it is and I just haven't noticed.

The village is amazing. I should say that the village decided to name me Adama which means have about dozen namesakes (tokra in pulaar) ranging from the original one, a pretty kick ass woman I think and a small two year old boy who loves to giggle and hold my hand.

I get called toubaub (foreigner-white person) still but its getting back. In the village I stop and tell them I'm not a toubaub I am Adama and I live here (the village has about 150 people so this isn't a problem as much anymore) and when I am riding my bike and hear someone call out "toubaub" I just shout back "balajo" which means black person. I love how in Africa it is isn't really offensive to point out someone's color or difference in appearence. It is a little harder to get used to the jokes especially between different language groups and families with last names. Diallos and Baldes are convinced they are better than each other. Sereis and Pulaars call each other their slaves. Its all in good fun and I have yet to see an insult used in a mean spirit.

Oh the bugs here are on steroids and I have a spider in my hut about the size of my hand who looks like a crab. His name his Sebastion and one day I will kill him. :)

Also I hate goats and chickens. Goats because they get into my backyard and eat my plants. But chickens most of all because there is this one chicken that comes into my hut, looks at me and poops like "what you gonna do sucker?" I told my host dad I'm going to eat that chicken after tabaski. He offered to sell her to me for 6 mille (about about 13-15 American dollars) but if the chicken ends up dead before then I won't mind. Maybe the snake will get it (ha who's laughing now Nuggets!)

Today is always Thanksgiving, the best holiday of all time, created in remembrance of harmony and gratitude to one and another (at least before the pilgrims and Indian's developed poor relations and tried to annihilate each other) and to celebrate food and football. We are attempting to make thanksgiving here (I'm attempting sweet potato casserole) but I just want to say to everyone Eat, Drink and be Merry!! Celebrate time with your families, to my family and friends just know that you are in my thoughts and I wish I could be there with you. There had better be no leftover green bean casserole left this year. I don't care who does it someone needs to step up and be me.

As always, love always

Meg

Ok quickHere is an address for which you send me stuff :)

Megan Thompson PCVB.P. 347 Kolda, SenegalWest Africa

It helps keep the collection price down if you label it educationl materials!!20 minutes till I go to site :)

I am officially a Peace Corps Volunteer!!

Yesterday we all got up early in our swear in outfits and went to the ambassador's house for the ceremony. We had a police escort, which means for two buses and two land rovers we had one police on a motor cycle. Let me tell you Dakar Traffic leaves something to be desired. To survive on these roads you must be an aggressive driver, which luckily all of our amazing drivers for PC have this quality. However if possible I was more sick than I have ever been because we kept cutting in and out of traffic and the bus kept going from zero to thirty to zero in the span of twenty feet. The window had to be open partially for air circulation since the bus had no air conditioning and second, I didn't know if I would be able to open it fast enough if my stomach decided to practice its up chuck reflex.

We arrived and went in, btw the house is gorgeous, and sat down. The ceremony started late but proceeded without any hitch, except I almost biffed it in when I went up to get my laminated card and notice of service in front of the national TV cameras. Woops. My shoes had no traction.

When we were called to stand and take our oath, this amazing feeling came over me. That this was real, that I had made it, and I was about to serve my country in the pursuit of peace. It was to say the least an emtional and empowering moment.

Afterwords we had mini quiches, bread and cheese, mini hamburgers (yummy!) and brownies. The woman carrying the tray out the food table almost alawys never made it to the table with food on the plate. The ambassador said she thinks the cooks love cooking for PCVs and we said they will never find a more grateful group.

Returning to the center we ready for our host families to arrive for the party. Since our families weren't based in Thies we could only have one member come and so my host mother came. I would have loved it if my entire family came but still it was a fun filled night followed by dancing in the lunch hut.

Tomorrow the Kolda group goes down to Kolda and Emily and I will be installed on the 11th, meaning we will individually be taken to our sites, introduced to our families, the gendarme, and dropped off with our stuff. On a super note we got our passports back which in theory should make it easier to cross the borders but most likely nothing will change and I will be short a few dollars by the time I get on the other side.

I have no doubt my only thoughts at some point will be don't leave me and what have I gotten myself into (I actually had this thought when I was first dropped off at the original homestay so I'm ready for it this time.)

I want to thank everyone at home for the support I've gotten. The letters, packages, emails, and phone calls helped me get through the tough spots and made me more determined to not give up. Hopefully I will have reseau in my village so I can still call people and as soon as I have an address I will post it.

Congratulations to Barack Obama on a well run campaign and my best wishes for a bright and successful presidency. Congratulations top everyone at home for surviving another presidential elections!

Love always!

I forgot to add this.  I get really vivid dreams because of the malaria medication I am on and I have had multiple dreams about Kelsey's wedding dress. Most of it involves finding it, getting it and then arriving at home to find we have the wrong dress.  Two nights ago we went on this insane adventure on some planet like mars and we were flying and we saw Hermione and Ron sinking into the sand, and Hermione may or may not have been wearing the dress.  And Kelsey you were orange.  Just tell me everything with the dress is ok because sometimes I wake up and it was so vivid I think it was real.  I have lots of other crazy dreams which range from scary where stuff on the walls start moving to really really sad to crazy hilarious.  Luckily I don't hear voices and I don't want malaria so I am going to keep taking the meds.  Not to mention I would be medically seperated if I was found not taking the medicine.  Seriously who wants malaria?  Not me.  And it would be lame to go home for not taking a pill once a week. Love again!

So I think I tried to do another post before but the power cut out and I lost everything.  However something that was important was my apology for the horrible grammar and sentence structure in my blog posts.  I promise I passed high school english but I just have so much to say and very little time and electricity to use (if any.)  I'm going to try harder to proof read but no promises.So today is election day!! AHHHI'm so excited for this day I almost wish I was back to experience this (minus the advertisements, and blatant but amusing hoaxes) in the US.  We are watching the election via CNN satellite at a local hotel but I'm not sure if I will make it to 4AM which is when the US election will end in America.   Everyone knows who I want to win and thats all I am going to say except I never thought that I would be watching one of the most important elections in the history of the US from Africa.  We swear in on Friday and if I passed my language exams I will go to Kolda on saturday.  We are paying the extra money to cross the border and we WILL have passports this time (by force if necessary.) If I don't pass then I will stay at the training center for another week and then leave.  I feel like I made some serious progress in my language skills especially since I was able to give some good ole American sass back to some of the men in my community.  We were talking about wives and since my time in homestay has been coming to a close, the number of marriage proposals has increased.  One night the guys were over and they just didn't understand why I didn't have or want a husband.  I finally just said "In America I have ten husbands and they cook and clean for me."  Said it in pulaar which made me feel really great. They got a huge kick out of it but the next question was to determine that I was Christian and thus only really believed in one spouse per spouse.  I couldn't pass as a catholic (forgot the name of the Pope, woops) so now they may think I am a lasped christian but whatever.   They talked about how in Senegal a man can have 4 wives and they do  all the house work because it is women's work.  I felt great telling them that women in the US are doctors, teachers, lawyers, engineers, and work outside the house all the time.   I should say that there are muslims families here though that do not practice polgamy and the are families that do who are still full of great people who I have grown to cherish as valuable friends and family members. Of course then one of them just kept telling me he was hungry and that I needed to make him something.  Me:  "you have hunger?"Him: "Yes"Me : "You want to eat?"Him: "Yes"Me:  "Then you go prepare something to eat!" 

I said it in what I believe was good pulaar because he laughed and stopped harassing me about it.  My sister/aunt taught me how to make tea here which is what Senegal is known for.  They do not drink real coffee here but seriously sugared, strong tea.  To cool it they do this pouring process from shot glasses which I suck at it.  I poured almost all of the tea on myself but I told her that before I return to America I will be a real pullo-debbo and will be able to pour tea (and coffee and any other hot liquid) without spilling.  She smiled.I felt like I got really close to my family and it was so hard to say good bye to them.  My sisters and I stayed up late the day before I left doing homework, dancing, making ataya, be sassying toward men, and catching mosquitoes.By the way I killed two mosquitoes with one hand clap-it was like killing two birds with one stone. But it was sad because my sisters started crying that night and when I gave my thank you speech my sister/aunt had to leave to room because she didn't want me to see her cry.  When I hugged my host mom I could feel her shaking and I am not going to lie I cried a little too.   We cried at every house. The families here have been so welcoming and they truly made us feel like we were part of the family.  This was the first time they had volunteers so we will always be each others first.  When people come to visit me (if they can) we are making a stop at galle-am to meet my first Senegalese family.   I really hope that I passed my exam so I can go to Kolda this saturday.  Allah-okki-kam arsika (God give me luck.) I will post my new address soon and I will once again tried to post pictures.  The internet connection is really slow.  The site they will be at is www.tboneinsenegal.shutterfly.com.

We saw our country director on television and when he started speaking pulaar I kind of understood him (because I definately didn't understand the french.) Wish me luck in the following months because they will be what determines the success of the rest of my service. Love always!Remember-Yes We Can!

Ok so I've looked at my last entry and I realized maybe I was a little to harsh on the men here.   We went to Dakar to tour the PC office (and eat AMAZING food-seriously the fries were on the side, not  on the hamburger and we got ice cream) and on the way back one of the current PCVs came back with us.  I mentioned what I had noticed and some gossip that I heard about people we know having very young wives or more than one wife.  He said that its weird but you get over it because you realize that there are some really great men in this country, who are good leaders and good people and they have a ridiciously young wife or more than one.  That said I'm still not completely ok with marriage standards here but I may find it easier to adjust to them as time goes by.I've been working really hard on my language skills and I proud to say I can ask a few questions with minimal gestures.  Questions such as thisHoto dogn-daa? -where do you run?Hodum namm-daa-What do you eat?And I can answer a few questions too!!   With a complete sentences!!  The moments of epiphany are wonderful and reassuring. I am also very happy to report that I was the happy recipient of 4 very large packages two days ago.  It took me two trips to carry them and it cost me about 5 mille but it was  worth the ten american dollars when I opened them to find hand sanitizer, oatmeal, colored pencils, undies (washing by hand is hard on them), a book (yes Nick Sparks!) magazine, peanut butter galor and candy.  Thank you everyone!!  Before that I also recieved cards and letters and I possibly feel more popular in Africa than I was in America.  Africa I guess makes me cooler :)We had the trainee-trainer game last friday.  We walked to the stad and as we enter we see these beautiful green fields.  Let me tell you Thies itself is not very green, except around the training center.  These were nice fields.  And they were full.  Not just full of everyday people but full of what the trainers called All Stars-people who had played professionally and now got together to fun.  The point of this is that fields were full except for the one in pack which was not a field as much as a sandpit where weeds were growing.  Thats where we played.  Beggars can't be choosers and I had been dying to play since I got to Senegal.  I played briefly a game of 3 v 3 a few days before but I was craving a real, intense, physical contact, potential for pain kind of game.  I was sore the next day and even more the day after that but it was worth it.  First of all the trainers can play soccer and it turned out so do many of the trainees. Apparently Only one team has beaten the trainers ever and we tied them (which they were not happy about.  If they counted the goal we scored when we were offsides then we would have won.)None of the female trainers played which made me kind of sad and a little more curious about the over all  athletic status of women in Senegal.  My host sister does Tawekondo (sp?) but I also consider my host family pretty progessive.  And I know women here are capable of engaging in sports because they are ripped.  I've seen more muscular women than I have seen of men.  I want to be this muscular and if I keep doing my  laundry there is a chance it could happen.  However ironing will be a bigger priority as one person in the stage got a case of mango flies on her bum and while all of us are sharing tons of personal information with each other and I don't want to have to get help pulling flies out of my skin.  This girl and her roommate have my respect for dealing with it so well.  If I had flies where the sun don't shine first I would cry, then I could laugh and then I'd call America to say "guess what happened today?"  Watch now I'm gonna get mango flies.   I find myself laughing a lot. Mostly because absurd stuff just happens constantly and its my way of dealing with it.   Like now, I think I have bed bugs because I have itchy bites all over my body concentrated on my knees, elbows, and ankles.  I even have some on my toes next pretty much underneath the toenail.  I had to cut my fingernails so it would be less satisfying to scratch.  Ooh and I am so not sick any more, Alhoumdililah!We had our counterpart workshops yesterday and today.  I met both my partners and they seem very nice and enthusastic about the work.  My mine one, who I think will either be my father or my brother in Kolda insisted on having every meal with him.  I got alot of language practice.  He said he was very excited to get a female volunteer which put on me on guard at first. I asked why and he said he had one female volunteer before but since then he has had two male volunteers, so he can have two of each.  I thought that was a pretty good answer.  Of course then I think he said the female volunteer married one of the villagers and took him back to America.  Not sure but I'm going to check that out and hope that I misheard him with my limited pulaar vocab because I do not want to be the volunteer who they expect to marry.  Ohh and I found out my installation date.  Its freaky.  We have two weeks exactly then we swear in.  It has gone by so quickly and I feel like I've learned a lot but also learned nothing.  I think I was able to post some pictures to the internet via Shutterfly.  If  any one knows a quicker and more available site to post pictures to please give me a shout out. Oh and kooi we should talk again-lets schedule something while I am in an area that has reseau.  The same goes for everyone else too!  Kolda is awesome but reception is not always a reality.   I'll post the link laterLove to all!

Hey everyone!!

I am alive (still YAY!)

I am going to try and sum up stuff that has been happening for the last 2-3 weeks.

I went back to my homestay village for 7 days. It was much better than the first two days there. I think the shock of senegal and the language and the serious motion sickness made it hard. My family is amazing still. I keep learning new things everyday about them and I'm pretty sure my sisters and aunts think I am one serious idiot in America.

For one thing it took my 5 more days to figure out that my father had a second wife and thats who we were visiting after sun down. SHe lives on the other side of town. We travelled at night because it was Ramadan and muslims fast from sun rise and sun set and so no one had energy to do anything in the middle of the day.

Don't worry I did get to eat in the middle of the day because Children don't fast. I still felt like a jerk for eating while everyone else didn't.

Another thing is that I am trying really hard to be involved in family activities like cooking, cleaning, and going to the market. I suck at all of them.

Cooking-I cannot cut onions for the life of me. I had this super dull knife and I was trying to be graceful like my aunts and when I dropped the onions in the bowl my 12 year old sister gave me a look like "are you serious? What do you eat in America.?"

Cleaning-we have these short bundles of hard straw for sweeping and I cannot sweep right. And don't even get me started on laundry because the first two days I was in village I successfully bleached half my close (and all of my nice shirts). Go me

Going to the Market-I don't know if I ever want to go again (I know I will because I like to eat) but just watching the flies crawl over fish and the unwashed vegetables makes me want to run away screaming. However I was only sick for two days when I got back from village and so far I have been good. The food isn't bad, its just limited. The good news is that I haven't found anything that I would not eat. The bad news is that it will probably be bad when I do, because I will likely eat it first and get sick afterword.

I learned all of this especially on Korite, the end of Ramadan. We heard all this stuff about how it was going to be this big all day party with lots of food and dancing and music. It didn't turn out that way.

We got up same time as usual and when I stepped out of the compound I looked down the road as they were slaughtering a cow. Hmm that explains the sounds of distress. I passed several other animals being slaughtered and I have to say that the Senegalese are really good at it. If I was killing something I would have blood all over me.

We (my mother, sisters, and aunts) spent the whole day cooking. We ate breakfast at like 9 and didn't eat again till 4pm. And this was a day I needed to take my malaria medication which you can't take unless you eat. We made TONS of cous cous (or lechiri as it is called here) with raisins and butter and sent out pots of it to wish everyone a great year and much success. We also put in the cow meat (you guess from which cow)

You want to know what the men did? Eat and sit all day. No cooking or cleaning or thank you this meal is delicious. Everytime they came in it was like they got a seat and something to drink and then left. This is probably insensitive of me but this country would fall apart and the men would starve and live in dirty huts without women. Hopefully I will be proven wrong in the next to years but so far I have not.

Oh I got a traditional outfit which I wore for 15 minutes on Korite (because it was friggin hot). I got pictures but I forgot the cord so no posting today. Sorry.

And I got a hamburger in Senegal. You know what comes on hamburger? A piece of meat, egg, mayo, ketchup, mustard, and french fries. Yes the potatoes are in bun. It was delicious.

Fast forwarding to now, I am writing this post in the Kolda regional house. One of the volunteers hosted me, Darren, and Jess for I think 4 days (time here is lost on me). He showed us around and around his current agriculture projects. He shall be referred to as the Ag Rockstar.

And his trusty site mate, shall always be referred to as the Cook King because we ate BBQ pizza and as I speak he is making cinnamon rolls.

Everyone in the Kolda region is really nice and welcoming. I really lucked out in my placement. Did I mention that I found out where I am going to be? Its in the Kolda region but I dont think I can post it (I'll check and report back). It has 167 people and it hasn't had a volunteer for about a year.

I will be living in a hut, with concrete walls and a thatch roof.

This will be very interesting.

Oh and never cross the Gambian border without your passport. We were so lucky we had someone who spoke french with us. We got to the last check point, we are in this HUGE peace corps van that has our stuff, our bikes, and a fridgerator on top of it. It is super obvious that there are people on this bus (like 6 plus the driver.)

The driver turns around and tells this will go alot quicker if we duck and hide and he pretends there is no one on the bus since it is raining and we don't have passports.

Hysterical laughing. PS We didn't have duck because it stopped raining but now we are taking the long way around the Gambia because I don't think they will let us back in.

I will report more later but other people are waiting for the computer.

I love and miss everyone!

Ok so life is going well. I have some gastrointestinal distress but I havent shit my pants-yet; According to all of the current volunteers it happens to every one no matter what. However I am becoming more ok with the idea of being sick because I think one of the sick bays is airconditioned /not really but I just know that I am going to sick in ways I have never imagined an never want to again/

I moved in with my host family on tuesday. It was the 45 minute drive through hell. I have never been so sick in my life. Seriously I was thisclose to vomiting and the only thing I could think was

If I dont throw up I will never complain about MI roads again. I will gladly pay taxes of whatever amount to never feel this sick again.

Seriously if it is one thing that could do me in it could be this car ride

Anyways I was dropped of first and this is what it looked like

Me-This close to vomiting as the landrover comes to a halt. Getting out of the car thankful to have dignity intact

The language trainer; abbrev to LT; gets out and goes in. I come in. Its a nice little place and there is a kind woman who turned out to be my host mom who approached me. LT looks around says something to the woman and then tells me he will be back-lets say he never came back.

This whole thing took maybe ' minutes and as I watched the car drive away the only thing that came to mind was this

This shit if for real.

I have a room seperate from the family main house, in this concrete oven which is nice and it was even better after the second day when my door was secured in place! Of course that madez the room that much hotter and I felt stupid for wanting to lock in the first place but the family would never steal from me and they respected my space hardcore. broke the bathroom door twice by touching it and I felt so bad but Mom Mbaalo said it was ok.

My sisters are amazing- I have 5

I have one brother for sure; a tyke named Mohammad. I think I may have two more but I have only seen them once.

I am named after my host mom so my name is Mari pronouced MAAR-EE

So far so good!

Love to everyone!

ok so I have two minutes before this comp shuts down. I am in Senegal and alive. only 4 shots so far, 7 more to go. Its intense being here but I like it: the people are friendly and the food is good. I dont know how pics will work but we shall see later: I love everyone!

Well I figured I should write something here about how to contact me. I'll be in Thies for training for the first three months (till November) and then if I have made it through training I will be sworn in and placed in a village. the first three months I hear are the hardest so please send me letters (nothing big yet, Just messages of love please.)

Megan Thompson PCT

Peace Corps/ Senegal Training Center

B.P. 299, Thies

Senegal

I've heard there is a better possibility of recieving my stuff in condition if "religious or educational materials" is written on the the letter. Also number your letters so I know if any got lost or haven't made their way to me. Mail here can take anywhere from a month to 2 months to never.

My email will be meganthompson15@gmail.com, so feel free to drop me a message when you can!

Love always and hopefully I'll be able to keep contact with everyone!

Meg

(also known as T-bone)

I feel so unprepared. I'm still trying to pack, sell my car, and spend time with my family and friends and I just feel like there is no way I gonna be completely ready at 6:30 AM September 8th to leave for the airport. My goal is to have all materials purchased by this Sunday.

My mom has been really nice to me lately. Its kind of creepy. She must be wigging out to be this nice to me all the time.

It kind of feels like everyone is leaving now. Colleen left for USF last Sunday, Kelsey went back to Indiana on Saturday. All my Alma buddies are heading back up to school. I'M leaving to go to Africa. Not only do we have the distance here to combat but now I havean ocean and unreliable mail service. Grrrr.

I received my staging kit on Monday, so I called SATO travel to make arrangements for my ticket from Detroit-Metro to Philadelphia. It took like ten minutes to arrange my ticket to a place I have never been before and where I will be spending the next two years.

Freaky.

Anyways I have been calling loan companies and evaluating what I have and what I need to get. I'm paranoid that I going to forget something and arrive in Philly without it and never even get to Africa. The checklist I have really helps control the freak outs.

Back in Dec. of '07 I applied for the Peace Corps. An interview took place in January and I recieved a nomination in February. After leaping over several medical obstacles (which weren't as much obstacles as they were my fear of all things sharp and pointy puncturing my skin) I gained medical clearance in May. However after two months of nail biting I finally recieved the blessed blue envelope which contained the invitation to the what could be the greatest adventure of my life.

This blog will hopefully serve as a means of expressing the next two years of my Peace Corps service in Senegal, Africa. There, I will be an Agroforestry agent meaning that I will spend my time teaching about sustainable agriculture and conservation.

I've waited a long time for this as I get closer, inevitably I will post more but I will try and post whenever I can.

For legal purposes this blog solely represents MY point of view and does not represent the views of the U.S. government, the Peace Corps, or the nation of Senegal. Please don't sue me because all I can give is one massive IOU until the my loans are paid off. And please don't sue me after that because I will still be poor.

Also please accept my grammar and spelling errors as I have already accepted and embraced my unique, imperfect style of expression.