I am embarking on the biggest project of my Peace Corps service: the construction of classrooms for the new high school. And for that, I need your assistance! The first and only high school here (and just the third in the region), it opened its doors this year to 250 students, and next year the student body will grow to about 500. To say the facilities are inadequate is an understatement—they currently consist of four permanent classrooms, three temporary classrooms, and makeshift offices for the administration. By “temporary” and “makeshift” I mean structures made of bamboo fencing and cornstalks, which provides little more than protection from the sand and sun, but does nothing against the wind and rain, which poses a major problem for these last few weeks of the school year, when rain interrupts classes and exams. The school has been blessed with teachers and administrators that are dedicated to their jobs, and daily push their students to succeed by demanding their best work.

With your help, I will finance the construction of three classrooms for the high school. These classrooms, along with the three pledged by another organization, will provide the students and administration with adequate facilities to pursue their learning. The community has contributed 31% of the cost, surpassing the terms of the Peace Corps Partnership Program, which demonstrates their investment and support for this project. It is up to me to finance the remaining 69%. All donations are tax-deductible, and will go entirely to fund the construction of classrooms at the high school in Kounkane (I will personally see to it!). To give, please visit the Peace Corps Partnership website (https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=685-142). You can also access this website by going to www.peacecorps.gov and clicking on Donate Now, then search by last name (Voorhees) or Project Number (685-142).

You can follow the construction via my flickr account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dvoorhees/sets/72157624173172560/

Here's the project description from the website:

This project will enable the construction of three (3) classrooms at the new community high school. The high school officially opened for the 2009-2010 school year, and serves a town as well as many other nearby communities. This year there are 225 students enrolled; next year the student body will grow to 500. Both the students and faculty are highly motivated, and eager to see this high school succeed. The current structure consists of four (4) permanent classrooms, two temporary classrooms, and a temporary office block. Due to the nature of the temporary structures (constructed using bamboo fencing and cornstalks), they are not adequate during all periods of the school year, especially near the end of the school year, when the rainy season begins. In order to facilitate learning, an additional 6 classrooms are needed to accommodate all the students. This project will provide for the construction of three classrooms, while the municipal authorities will construct the remaining three. Thanks to this project, students will be able to remain at home for high school, which improves both their learning environment and the general educational environment in the community. Having a local high school encourages girls' education in particular, because families are hesitant to send their daughters away to larger cities. These students will serve as role models for younger children, who will be able to witness members of their community continuing their education to higher levels.

Just go to https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=685-142 to donate now!

The other day I had a meeting at the Women's Center and was the last to show up. This is the opposite of me being the first to show up to meetings when I was new here, so I've come full circle. The meeting started right about when I got there, so either they were waiting on me or I now have perfect Senegalese timing. I like to think the latter. My excuse for showing up a little before 5 for a meeting that was supposed to start at 3: the sun was very hot, and I was taking a much needed nap.

The newest group of volunteers has arrived in Kolda, and we'll be going to my village tonight, so they can install from there tomorrow. We've spent the weekend taking them shopping for things they'll need that are hard to get outside of Kolda, and setting up bank accounts for them. It's been tiring, but always appreciated by the new people! Yesterday Mike and Darren cooked a pig, so we had some very tasty barbeque for dinner. Delicious, and lots leftover for today.

The high school finally got its community contribution for the project to construct three more classrooms, which was actually way sooner than I anticipated by at least a month. So turns out I’m in the school construction business, not just the fundraising business. I’ve filed all the paperwork with Peace Corps and hopefully (inchallah) the project will be online in the next week or so so I can start fundraising! They’ve already made the bricks, and are just waiting for the money to come in to start construction! I can honestly say this is the most motivated I’ve seen people here to get something done.

The other day, Dioulde asked me how the post works. He’d been to Velingara to mail something to Spain for someone, and remarked that it doesn’t cost anything (except for the stamp). I explained that from Velingara it gets sent to Tamba, to Dakar, to Madrid, to wherever it’s going in Spain. Each house has an address and postal code to make sure it gets to the right place. A little different from the system here, where you give something to a driver going where it needs to go, and then someone picks it up from him at the other end. I’d never really thought about the complexity of the post before, but it still makes more sense to me than the system here, although they do sort of amount to the same thing.

I saw my first bootleg iPod in village last week. It says iPod, and generally looks the same, but the interface is different, and the buttons do different things (the wheel doesn’t respond to rotating, menu is play, and play/pause does volume. I also had to explain that there is actually a battery in there, despite the fact that you can’t see it or take it out. Just means that if it dies, you have to buy a new iPod instead of a new battery.

“If you do that again, I’ll beat the shit out of you, if God wills it.” Is an oft-repeated phrase around here that never really struck me as humorous till recently. When would God ever will that? But it’s just part of a string of threats, and the God willing it part it what tops it off. At least a little amusing.

Also amusing is while doing the monthly accounting, sending one person off to check on something because “he’s a bandit” while hiding a little money for yourself. A little bit ironic, don’t you think?

I have also found a new, nearly foolproof way to put myself to sleep: BBC podcasts. Sometimes I have some trouble falling asleep, and this seems to have cured it. It works in the car, and in my bed. Just something so soothing and sleep-inducing (soporific?) about the British commentator. Listening to the BBC on the radio in the mornings does not have the same effect.

In two weeks, I’ll have a lot of new neighbors. I’ll spend another week in village, then go to Kolda to welcome the new Volunteers, help them buy stuff to furnish their huts, and generally get them ready for installs. I’ve already helped buy stuff for the people near me, which really isn’t that big a deal to me at this point, but they’ve all thanked me a lot. I forget how hard things are at the beginning—it is a pretty steep learning curve, and I’m almost at the end of it.

I had a very nice, unexpected, trip to America a few weeks ago. My grandfather passed away, so I took some vacation time to come back for his burial at Arlington. I’m glad I still had those vacation days. The ceremony was excellent—he received full military honors (21 gun salute, caisson, riderless horse, the whole 9 yards), and I had the opportunity to see family and friends that I otherwise would not have gotten to see for another 6 months at least. Just too bad that a funeral was the reason that brought us together.

My Senegalese family have been very nice and understanding about me going home for the funeral. When I told them, they gave me their condolences and said completely understood that I was going back. Because that’s what they would have done. It wasn’t nearly as big a deal as I thought it would have been. Just, your grandfather died, so you’re going home for a couple weeks, makes perfect sense. Unlike when I went back the last time, for vacation, and all the questions were about how much the ticket costs and what they want you to bring back for them. When there’s a funeral, people come up with the money for the ticket, and gifts aren’t really expected. In retrospect, I probably would have made up a funeral for when I went back the first time, and announced it a few days before I left. It was way easier. Maybe also because I’ve been here longer at this point?

My return to the village has been a little rough, since it’s the height of the hot season. And I honestly think the first two days I was back were hotter than the rest of them. Maybe just my perception. Regardless, it’s really, really hot (today 111 in the shade, over 120 in the sun). I’m constantly sweating. The only upshot is the mangoes. And the knowledge that the rains are coming soon. At least that’ll cool things off a bit. It rained just a tiny bit last night, but I still went outside to enjoy the couple drops. Also the day I got back I broke my baby toe. My fault-I kicked the corner of my bed. Still hurts, and is swollen, so I don’t want to go running because that’d probably make it worse.

It’s also been a little weird coming back because it happened to coincide with a lot of my neighbors (and friends) leaving, having completed their two years. So for the moment, there’s way fewer people around, but in a few weeks, there’ll be a lot of new people around. I met them briefly in Kolda last week, and they seem nice, and generally excited to be here. I think the next 6 months will be full of me showing them the ropes, and setting up new sites around me, which is something I actually think I’ll enjoy doing. It’ll be interesting to have their new, unjaded perspective on things. And weird to be in the group that’s been here the longest.

In the random goings-on in the village department, some women from Niger showed up yesterday selling stuff. They’re Pular, and I could actually understand most of what they were saying. They were selling traditional medicines (powder, to make hair grow back, or for good fortune in business). I asked if there was anything for the heat, but unfortunately there wasn’t. She gave me a small beaded bracelet as a gift, because she knows white people don’t like the traditional medicines. I would’ve bought something for the heat if she’d had it.

The other day I was being daring and checking my email in the afternoon (I usually only use my computer at night, after “going to bed” and my door’s closed), and Fatimata caught me. She really startled me. So now they know I have a computer (luckily I can say I got it when I was in America, so it doesn’t seem like I’ve been hiding it for months as I have been). And now I can use it in the afternoon, since I know that they know. So it’s not that bad. Less secretive can be a good thing I guess.

One funny question I got when I got back was how much meat costs in America. Not totally out of the blue—they’d asked if I’d eaten lots of meat when I was there (yes, of course, because that’s what Americans do. And what Senegalese would do if they had a lot of money). And then asked how much a kilo of meat costs. They were stunned that I had no idea. For one, it depends on what kind of meat (filet costs more than ground chuck; plus there’s beef, chicken, and pork), so the possibilities are sort of endless. The other is I haven’t bought meat in at least a year (if I did last May). But I don’t know that I’d know even if I did buy meat regularly. Do you? Weird that that’s something that seems like common sense here, but isn’t for me.

I got a SPA grant to fund a soapmaking training last weekend, so last week was all about finished touches. The metalworker finished all the molds, which were beautiful, but then we got in a big fight about how much I agreed to pay. I'm 99.999999% sure we agreed on 7,000 each, down from 10,000 that I had budgeted, but then he tried to make me give the extra money to someone, and I refused. Then he claimed we'd agreed on 10,000. I ended up giving him 8,000 (and my mom took some money out of the food budget). But it was so frustrating! Now it's over. I think the training went really well. Everybody got there reasonably on time, the program generally ran itself (minimally me running out for things we forgot), we had good food. But they might have put too much lye in it... hopefully no one gets hurt. Anyway, it was generally a success, and now all I have to do is write up the completion report.

Another highlight of the past week was a traditional wrestling tournament at the middle school (middle and high school boys competed). There were a lot of people there, and it was a lot of fun. One of the few cultural events that was fun!

I just posted a lot of pictures (and some video) on flickr.

(are not a big deal in Senegal, but since they just passed...)

Recently there’s been a toubab invasion in my town. Not only me and Emily (PCVs), but also the 2 French people working on a biofuels project, a Spanish couple visiting with a friend who’s from here but lives in Spain now, and French hunters. I’m not a fan. I kind of liked being the only one (or two) around. Oh well, vacation will be over soon and they’ll go home.

Also in the village, last Thursday there was a freak incident. I’m not sure how else to describe it (I wasn’t there, just heard from Emily and the villagers later). About 20 girls fell down/fainted and had seizures at the middle school. They were taken to the health post, and later walked away normally. I think one girls started it, and others happened after that. They’re blaming jinnes, evil spirits, (actually a particular one, Jinne Maimouna) and have since called the marabouts in the area and killed a cow to make it go away. It’s worked so far. I can’t say I like the jinne explanation, but I don’t have anything better…

Last week I worked on the net distribution for 4 days. The first 2 days we went to Pakour, then Mike and I went to a launch ceremony in Vel on Friday, and distributed in Bonconto Saturday. Quite a busy week. It was actually less hectic than I thought it was going to be. Maybe I just got lucky by going with good health relays. They had done a census to figure out how many nets each household needed (and were pretty accurate, as far as there not being a lot of contestation about how many everybody should have gotten). Then the numbers were sent to Velingara, Kris planned the cars (who/where/how many), and the day of distribution we went out in teams to different villages/distribution points. Each point had under 500 nets to make it manageable (I think the ideal is probably around 200, but the biggest I did was 250). Then we, with the relays, opened the bales and bags of nets, organized them by household, and wrote the village, year, and household name on each net (to prevent giving away/reselling them). The relays lead a discussion on malaria, and how to take care of the nets, and then we exchanged nets for coupons given out during the census. Then, si Alla jabi, everyone’s happy and we get back in the car and leave. Si Alla jabaani, people are angry about not getting the number of nets they think they deserve, and the relays have to go back and see if they’re telling the truth. If they do deserve more nets, they send a request via the health post and they’ll be sent from Velingara (eventually).

It was an interesting experience, and I’m glad I participated in a distribution before it’s my town’s turn (I’m sort of dreading that, since they’re dragging their feet on starting the census and I don’t know how much I trust them to do accurate counts). One thing that was surprising was that no one ever offered us lunch, even though we were distributing right around lunch time, and culturally you’re always supposed to offer food. Maybe they figured we’d just decline it anyways, or didn’t have any leftovers, but still, it’s rude not to at least offer! The launch ceremony was less than exciting. Just a typical ceremony for all the important people to greet each other and say how happy they are to be there and be a part of this project etc. It was supposed to start at 9, actually started at 11:30, and went to 2 (saved by Friday prayer time!). There was no lunch, to the disappointment of the women who showed up at 1:15 (for lunch). Hopefully that doesn’t affect perceptions of the distribution as a whole too much.

I recently listened to a program on the BBC about Rwanda and how well it’s doing. The government apparently set up a 20 year plan to become a middle income country by 2020, and is actually hitting its targets at the halfway point. I guess they’re motivated, and the population is also motivated. So they’re building roads, installing fiber optic cables, and encouraging foreign investment and entrepreneurship. Sounds amazing. And furthers my theory that Senegal could also develop if the whole country worked hard for 10-20 years (showed up to 9:00 meetings at 9:00 instead of 11:30, went to class, did homework, gave up attaya, spent money on longer-term things than clothes and hair, etc.). Of course, that won’t happen any time soon, so it’s just a fantasy. Anyway, go Rwanda!

My family has taken to calling attaya (tea) chai, which bothers me. Maybe that’s what they call it in the Gambia, but chai is a whole different drink. Attaya involves low-grade green tea and lots of sugar. Chai involves (I think) black tea, spices, sugar, and milk. Totally different, so please stop calling attaya chai!

Kelly’s giving one of her dogs away and taking the other back to America. So kalabante is staying with me tonight in preparation for his trip to Kolda tomorrow. It’s been fun having a dog for a night. He’s cute, and afraid of my watering can (I did sprinkle him a little bit, sorry). But also whines a lot when no one’s around, so I’m kind of glad it’s just for tonight. My family alternately thinks he’s funny, or scared of him. I don’t think they’d like me adopting a dog of my own.

A few nights ago was a full moon, a particularly nice one at that (orange, very pretty). And all my family was looking at it (unusual, since it's not a rare occurrence), because they saw one of their marabouts (religious leader) in the moon. I didn't see it. I'm pretty sure it was just the man in the moon that's always there. See if you see the resemblance--Mansour Sy. I did correct them that Yuri Gagarin was the first man to orbit the earth, but didn't make it to the moon. I hope I'm actually right on that.

Today was actually quite productive (the first one of those I've had in a while). I negociated a price for the soap molds, less than I'd anticipated, and sent out invites for the meeting tomorrow to discuss this soap training. And had an interesting conversation with Doudou Konte, a former PC language trainer from about 20 years ago, who happened to be stopping in my village. I was talking with Darren, and he overheard us talking about "our villages" and said There's only one kind of person that talks about my village. Indeed, Peace Corps. Seems like a nice guy.

I went up to Dakar two weeks ago (along with the rest of Peace Corps Senegal and some PC from other countries) for the annual All Volunteer Conference and softball tournament (WAIST). It was good to see everyone, and to learn a bit about what other people are doing, and of course have some fun and play some softball. This year felt a more low-key than last year, either because I’d been before and knew what was going on, knew more people, or maybe the Volunteers this year were more low-key (Mauritania wasn’t there). Anyway, it was a good time.

The last day, Jess and I went fabric shopping at Marche HLM. I bought about twice as much fabric as I intended (so pretty! I think they’d just gotten a new shipment from wherever it is fabric comes from), so now have 9 meters of fabric I don’t know what to do with. With the other 6 meters, I’m going to have a pair of pants and a wrap dress made. I think Senegalese émigrés go to HLM to buy lots of fabric to take back to Europe and sell—we saw one woman with rice sacks full of fabric, counting literally thousands of euros in cash. I’m pretty sure we stopped and stared. Needless to say, the owners of that stall were too busy to help the likes of us. I’m still stunned by that amount of money.

I bought a world map poster in Kolda and gave it to my family here, to facilitate their learning geography. Interestingly, the first question was “Where’s Haiti?” I pointed out Haiti (which they thought was in Africa, or at least closer to Africa than America), and they concluded that Abdoulaye Wade’s plan to repatriate Haitians to Senegal was dumb, because it’s so far away. Yes, indeed, dumb plan. So the map was a good investment. And the tie I got Dioulde was also a hit. It was already tied when I bought it, so no need for anyone to learn how to tie a tie properly.

Now I think I'm getting sick. Bad cold/possibly the flu. I popped a ton of Vitamin C today, in hopes of warding it off. Luckily I got both flu shots.

What do all these things have in common, you might ask? All in a week's work, this week for me.

Monday started out with a trip to Velingara for a big meeting about this net distribution we'll be doing, to achieve universal coverage in the whole department of 227,000 people. Ashton Kutcher donated the money to Malaria No More when he beat CNN to be the first to have 1 million followers on Twitter (I think). http://content.usatoday.com/communities/kindness/post/2010/01/ashton-kutchers-twitter-nets-arriving-in-africa-to-save-lives-from-malaria/1

It was one of the better meetings I've attended in this country--minimal talking in circles or getting hung up on inane points. Which was impressive for the number of people in attendance, from a number of organizations, including people who are relatively high up (relatively being the operative word). That said, this was another 9 am meeting that started at 11:30, which seems to be about par for the course here. That was annoying. But I think we got a lot of the logistical stuff figured out, and everyone seems to be on the same page (I'd just like someone to send me a summary of the meeting so I know what page exactly I'm on...). A few of us ended up leaving the meeting early so we could get home. Sadly, it took Emily and I about an hour longer to get home in a car than it took Kelly to bike back. I'll bike next time. It was also really nice to see other volunteers I hadn't seen in a while. We shared some good laughs and good food (chicken yassa with OLIVES!). So that was Monday.

Tuesday marked the beginning of a Maternal and Infant Health training for young mothers that was my idea, financed by WorldVision and executed by the local health personnel. I have a new (greater) appreciation for them. They really know their stuff, and their audience. It was way better than me attempting to babble something in Pular. It actually went off very well, despite it seeming a bit thrown together at the last minute. It seemed like the girls were engaged and actually learned something, which was the point. This three-day thing

included why to get regular checkups at the hospital/health post when pregnant, and for your child; proper nutrition; and sex ed.

Wednesday I was thankfully at site and nowhere in the vicinity of Touba, as that was the day of the annual pilgrimage (called Magal). Last year I was in Thies when it happened, and it was clear just how much it disrupted transport and live in general in that area of the country. This year, I didn't get the scale so much as the reach. Even people from lowly Kkne made the trip. I can't imagine many things I'd rather not do. The trip sounds like hell (crowded cars for over 10 hours), as does being there (LOTS of religious semi-fanatics and an annual outbreak of cholera, at least according to rumors). That's one pilgrimage I won't be attending anytime soon, thank you. I biked to Diaobe to try to find some coffee seeds for an ag volunteer in Kedougou. It was probably my nicest time in Diaobe yet (the standards aren't that high). I left around 7:30, got there about 8, had a good bean sandwich, found the coffee seeds I was looking for, at a price I was very happy with, bought some avocados, and biked back. And I didn't get robbed. A highly successful morning, if you ask me. I'd like to credit the Magal, since everyone was in Touba instead of Diaobe, even the bandits. So it was only locals and Guineans there, so it was quite pleasant (all friendly Pulars). And avocados!! I hadn't seen them since July probably. That was a nice little surprise (although one had a worm in it, not such a nice surprise).

Thursday was the last day of the health training, meaning it was busy, and I was tired. That's about all the summary of that day...

Today was a great end to a busy week. The big event: the baptism of Dienaba's baby. It was my first all-day baptism (I usually just crash the evening portion), and I was a little bit apprehensive about the scale, given my experience with the wedding a little over 9 months ago (funny how that works...). I am deeply grateful to the imam that banned having speakers at baptisms, because that meant that today was actually pleasant! I could stay in my hut in peace, nap, read, whatever, without music blasting so loud I can't think. The baby's name is Hassan, named for his paternal grandfather. He was named in the morning, we ate some lakh and cosam (traditional baptism food), sat around, ate tcheb for lunch, sat around some more, and had meat for dinner. A lot of sitting went into this day. For me, I hid out in my hut for most of it, caught up on sleep, and finished Animal Vegetable Miracle. And the food's always disappointing, because I forget that I know what it'll be, and it's never as good as what we usually have. Well, the meat and onion sauce was good. But for dinner the sheep's head was in the bowl (gross), and I managed to eat around it better than I did on Tabaski, but then had to endure my sister's literally sucking its brains out. Gross concept, gross noise. I said I though eating brains was disgusting, and said I don't eat that, to which she replied that I've eaten it. I declined to inquire whether it was tonight, or Tabaski. Gross. But generally a good end to the week, minus that very last bit.

Reading Animal Vegetable Mineral (by Barbara Kingsolver) was odd in Senegal. It's all about knowing where your food comes from. No problem. I'm pretty sure 90% of my food comes from right here (including the aforementioned sheep). Not so much the imported rice, but reading about going to farmers markets and stuff was a little weird when ALL fresh food comes straight from the farm/garden. I'd actually be in favor of a little more food transformation here... It was also slightly torturous reading about all the delicious food you can grow in your very own North Carolina backyard. Unfortunately the Sahel climate doesn't quite cooperate like that. Alas.

I'll be in the village for the next couple days, before heading into Kolda then up to Dakar on Wednesday for All Volunteer Conference and WAIST. Should be fun. Oh what a difference a week makes, between this Friday night in the village and next Friday night in Dakar.

Dienaba had her baby on Friday (clearly she waited till I went to Kolda to have it. It’s a boy, and doesn’t have a name yet (not till the baptism this coming Friday). He’s cute. I think 3.5 kg at birth.

I was concerned for the baby because Dienaba didn’t have any breastmilk, so they were feeding it kinkiliba (a local tea), and vitamin syrup from the poste de santé. I thought this was idiotic, since that has essentially no calories, and newborns clearly need calories. Plus, wouldn’t you go for the closest substitute for breastmilk—cow’s milk, powdered milk, or formula? What were these idiots thinking?? The other 2 Volunteers in the area agreed with me. But then I talked with Mom tonight and she didn’t think it was such a dumb idea. Babies need to be hydrated, the tea would mean the water’s clean (since it had been boiled), and it would get some calories from the sugar they put in it. And that giving them formula really early can make them not like breastmilk. I guess that makes sense, but still, do you really want to be giving a newborn sugar? Won’t he get addicted to it? Shows you how much I know about babies… yet another reason why I don’t plan on having any anytime soon.

That’s the big news for now. This week I have a packed schedule: Monday meeting in Velingara about this net distribution, Tues-Thurs health training for young mothers (funded by WorldVision), Wed go to Diaobe in search of coffee seeds for another PCV (should be interesting, since I have no idea what I’m looking for exactly or how much it should cost), Friday baptism. Busiest week I’ve had in a while. Then the week after that I’m off to Dakar for All-Volunteer Conference and WAIST!

There's a crazy rumor going around Senegal (literally, all of Senegal, and probably spreading into more of West Africa). Word on the street is that people are going around offering gifts ($20, phone credit, clothes, etc.), and of you accept the gift, you will die shortly after. These people are supposedly jinns (evil spirits), or Nigerians (we think that's a case of "telephone" getting stuff mixed up). They may be driving a black Pajero. And if the gendarmes put them in jail, they disappear. All very scary yes? But there have been no confirmed deaths, according to the gendarmes (although, as my family pointed out, the gendarmes can't really do anything about evil spirits, can they?). It's all hearsay, that 3 women died in Diaobe, or that a child died in Velingara, but no one can actually say that this person died or that person died, but they can't. And within the communities near my village, people should be able to know who exactly died. This rumor has made both the radio and national television. I think that's a pretty remarkable spread of information.

I’ve been back in the village a week, since being gone for a while for the holidays. It’s been busy, which is good. It feels like everything’s happening at the same time—the formation at the Case is moving along, I should be starting computer lessons for both the girls and a couple people from the general population, although no one showed up today. I’ve submitted my SPA grant for a soap training, which will hopefully get funded. WorldVision finally decided to fund a project I submitted in early October to give health classes to young mothers. And hypothetically this mosquito net distribution will happen soon, although given the lack of action/new information I have my doubts.

I finished Trois Femmes Puissantes by Marie NDiaye, a French writer whose parents emigrated from Senegal. It won the Goncourt Prize last year, and is excellent. I highly recommend it for anyone who speaks French (otherwise, you’ll just have to wait for it to be translated to English). It’s about three women of Senegalese origin, and talks about their personal struggles as well as various issues involving emigration through their narratives. It’s a lot deeper/more complicated than that…you’ll just have to read it. I wish I had a literature class with whom to discuss it! It’s very very good.

In another émigré-related story, I emailed pictures from Tabaski to my host brother in Spain who I’ve never met. He emailed me back two pictures of him, for me to show to his family here. I finally did this week, and it was really cool to see them see the pictures. They’re the first pictures they’ve seen of him since he left 5 years ago. Dioulde even took a picture of the computer screen with his phone, and showed it to Ousmane and Aminata, my host brother’s kids who live in my compound. Hooray for technology. I really think that’s something that could make a big difference in development—communication between émigrés and people here. Because they don’t talk that often (it’s too expensive), and don’t write letters or send pictures (no email or physical addresses here), and when they do talk, it’s generally around the holidays when the people here ask the émigrés for money. Which can’t be all that fun for the people abroad. I think when people start having internet access and email addresses, they’ll be able to keep in touch better with relatives abroad, which will also help give people here a real picture of life abroad (not necessarily all like Desperate Housewives). Because for all the development work big organizations do, I think small scale, intra-community efforts can be more effective. Inshallah.

This marks the end of my 3-week+long vacation in SeneGambia. Mom arrived on the 15th, and we promptly went to the village (in the relative comfort of a Peace Corps car) on the 16th. It was a long trip, but we made it in one piece. Everyone was very happy to see us (especially Mom), and we spent 2 days in the village, which was enough for Mom, but not enough for the village. I think it was a good couple days, mostly because it was uneventful. No massive gatherings with loud music, no health issues, and everyone got along and appreciated the company. I'd call that a success. Although Mom did get sick of the rice and corn couscous (after 2 days?! try 2 years). The ride back was a bit of an adventure. We bought tickets the night before from Kabendou (nearby town) to Dakar the night before, and 4/7 tickets had been bought, so we figured we'd leave 9-10 am. We were ready then, anyways. So we waited, and waited, and heard a variety of stories as to what was going on in Kabendou, until the car finally left at 2 pm. At that point we were ready to just go to Tamba and spend the night and leave from there the next morning. But we ended up making record time, getting in to Dakar at 11:30. The Kaolack-Tamba road is infinitely better now than it was a year ago. But they're starting work on the Velingara-Tamba section, so that doesn't bode well (I don't go that way very often anyhow). We were dirty, tired, hungry, and exhausted, but we made it!

The next day we went to Goree Island, which is probably the biggest tourist attraction in Dakar/Senegal. It was nice, though. The souvenir sellers were relatively tame, and we bought some jewelry from a woman I decided to buy from. I realized I was being conned a little, but decided to fall for the "I'm from Goree, not one of those Dakarois profiteers, I'm your age, and my baby's birthday's tomorrow!", and got a nice seaglass necklace and some other stuff for not horribly ridiculous price. We also had lunch at a nice quiet place by the ocean. Generally a success.

Paul arrived the next morning. Well, he was supposed to arrive in the morning, but DC got record snow the day before he was supposed to leave, so he arrived in the early afternoon. After resting up a bit, we went for a long walk to the southernmost point of Dakar (what I like to call the End of the World, since that's what it feels like). The next day we went to the Marche HLM, where Mom and Paul bought some fabric, and we found a random tailor to make Paul a boubou. Then we went to Palmarin for Christmas, which was excellent. It's so quiet and peaceful after Dakar. We stayed at Niassam, in one of the lovely lagoon rooms. The lagoon, on the other hand, was not so lovely. Fine to look at, but Paul and I managed to tip the canoe, falling into the 2 feet of water, 5 feet of black goo (either silt or bird poo), then swimming the canoe back to the dock. Highly unpleasant. I'll never go back in the lagoon. We did do a good kayak trip with Pierre, Chris's counterpart. It was a great day trip, light kayaking through the mangroves, lunch and swimming in the middle of the day, and an easy trip back. The meals, especially Christmas Eve dinner, were excellent, although Mom and Paul got tired of bread for breakfast. Christmas Eve included Zebu meat, which we weren't familiar with but the waiter told us it was "beef, cow," so that cleared things up. It's also fun to say. We had a hard time saying goodbye to Palmarin, but we went back to Dakar so Mom could get her flight back home.

Paul and I went to Banjul (and surrounding areas) for New Year's. It was fun, if ridiculous in a way that Senegal could never be since they don't speak English. For example, people saying "happy couple" as they walk by us. Just doesn't translate 100%. We got a cab to Banjul no problem (well other than it just took us to the border then left us to fend for ourselves). But we got there, and paid a normal amount (we think) for a visa, 350 dalasi each. We spent a day walking around the beach (nice beaches) and Serekunda, had Indian food (good, but not amazing). Then we spent a day in Banjul (Arch 22 is quite impressive). And a day at the beach in Bakau. We discovered that the people that vacation in The Gambia are a slightly different breed than those that vacation in Senegal (British, Swedish, Northern Europeans vs. French, Spanish, Southern Europeans). And that Gambians only understand English spoken with their accent, slowly. It was a lot of fun. New Year's Eve was particularly interesting, in that each disjointed piece was unbelievable. We struck out for a restaurant recommended by Lonely Planet, and on the way encountered the beginnings of a Konkoran procession (teenagers in costume being slightly menacing). Then we walked into the restaurant, where there's a salon in the downstairs. They directed us upstairs, where a guy sitting there was remarkably uninformative as to whether the restaurant was in fact open. Turned out he worked there, and someone directed us to a table. The decor was low-hanging plants and other low-hanging stuff. We sat in the back, and felt as if Odd Job was about to ambush us. It was a little more expensive than we'd bargained for. Then the waiter brought us a bell to ring when we were ready to order. We were so concerned about being ambushed that we decided to sneak out and find another restaurant. We succeeded at that. Just as we ran into the Konkoran again, we found another restaurant that was actually pretty good. Then we went out to around SeneGambia and watched the fireworks on the beach with all the teenagers. Oh to be 15 and Gambian... Overall a good time though.

After Gambia, we made our way back to Dakar fairly leisurely, with an overnight stop in Kaolack. We met Dad and Celia at the airport, and stayed at the Radisson, which was really nice, despite the infinity pool being closed due to land falling into the ocean (as the security guard phrased it). We went to Goree Island, and wandered around Dakar a bit, then went to Saly where we enjoyed the beach despite being a little bit sick to the stomach. But it was fun nonetheless.

And now I'm back to "normal" life in Senegal--I'll go back to the village tomorrow and try to resume my daily rhythm. It was great having everyone visit, and will be a bit of a downer going back...

I posted pictures on flickr (but have put a lot of them as private for contacts, so if you want to see them add me as your contact, and I'll add you, and you can see my pictures!). Only slightly more complicated than leaving them as public.

Noos means fun in pretty much all the Senegalese local languages. And for the most part, Dakar=noos. I've been here for 10 days (actually, I'm ready to leave, and will be doing so tomorrow, inshallah), noosing on weekends, and working during the week. I had an office job for the past week, working on language manuals. Slightly painful, but we're done now, and I got some other work done as well. But on the weekends, there was the American Club (pool and volleyball), Nice Cream, and softball (complete with real beer and bratwurst)! As well as the Artisan Expo, where I got some really cool (but really heavy--sorry Mom) chairs, made by Ellen's guy from Diourbel. I also got to see a lot of people from my training group, passing through Dakar on their way to vacations in American or elsewhere. I have to admit, I'm a little jealous, but my family's coming here, so I'm ok. I'm currently checked into the hotel, anxiously awaiting Mom's arrival in just a few hours!! Then tomorrow it's off to the village!

Last week was feast week here in Senegal. The PCVs of Kolda gathered

for Thanksgiving on Tuesday, and had a nice little Turkey Day

(complete with turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin

pie). Then we all headed back to site for Tabaski on Saturday. I spent

Friday morning getting my hair braided by my host sister Ndiollé. I

think it looks better than the braids I got last year, which might

just be that my hair's longer this year. I'm hoping to leave them in

till I leave site on Thursday evening. For some reason I enjoyed last

year's Tabaski more than this year's, despite our having two sheep

this year and me actually sort of understanding what was going on. But

maybe the knowing what was going on made it less fun. The random

people greeting who do extended greetings to test my Pular gets old,

since I do in fact know what they're saying, whereas last year I guess

I was content to just smile and nod. And at this point I'm more

practiced in identifying what part of the animal I'm eating, so that

probably made the feasting a little less pleasant. I now refuse to eat

stomach or intestines, since I know what it is. And I remain puzzled

as to why they bother cooking the head, when there's no desirable meat

on it. It just grosses me out.Another major source of annoyance was the picture-taking. Or rather

being harassed to take pictures of everyone, then being harassed about

the fact that I post them on the internet. They don't get what "taking

pictures to the internet" means. I think they think I'm posting them

on some dating service or something, which I'm not. I don't

fundamentally have a problem with émigrés or people I don't know

looking at my pictures. But I do have a problem with being harassed

about me posting them. Because I do actually think it's nice that

their relatives living abroad can see their pictures. And that my

family and friends at home can also see my pictures.Anyway, I'm done with Senegalese holidays for a while, and getting

excited about celebrating American holidays with my real family!Yesterday something very strange happened. At about 1 pm, a women's

group showed up at my house to greet my mom. Surprise! My family

initially thought they had showed up to crash lunch, which would have

been very rude (10 people showing up right before lunch time and

expecting to be fed is a faux pas even here). But then they said they

didn't want to inconvenience anyone, and went and bought sodas for

everyone. They also bought stuff at the market and proceeded to cook

lunch. And my mom had large speakers brought in for added fun (not for

me). After I ate lunch (Fatimata had already cooked, after all), I

disappeared into my hut, put in earplugs, and read for a little bit.

Then Dioulde came and asked if we could make tea in my backyard.

Feeling generous, I said OK (I may regret this later if it becomes a

daily thing). It was marginally quieter back there. I think my whole

family ran away from this impromptu event. General consensus: very

bizarre, and unnecessary. Especially the music. Nice to know that some

things are socially awkward here too.

I biked in to Kolda this morning/early afternoon, all 96 km. I left at 7 am, took a breakfast break in Dabo for 45 minutes, and got to Kolda at 1:30 pm. Right about the 6 hour biking time I'd bargained for. Now I'm exhausted and slightly sunburned, so I will continue relaxing and hydrating for the rest of the day. I'm on my 6th liter of water. I wanted to do it once, and now's the best time since it's relatively cool, and I doubt I'll do it again.

Preparations are underway for Thanksgiving on Tuesday (moved due to Tabaski on Friday/Saturday). We have a turkey, thanks to Uncle Sam, and will cook other traditional Thanksgiving dishes. Should be fun.

The other day on the way back from my run, a woman on the road gave me a blessing I really like: May (God help) you find what you're looking for. I think it's applicable to pretty much any person or situation (especially for well-wishing directed at complete strangers, as in this case). But also, whether she intended it this way or not, applicable to me. As in, you're really out of place here, but whatever made you come all the way here, I hope you find it. Which also works for me. Anyway, I've been appreciating this random blessing for the past few days.   The cold season has started for sure. It was 62°F the other morning when I got up, and hasn't been getting ridiculously hot during the day, and it should continue to cool off. This bodes well for the people visiting soonJ   I finally started computer classes last week for 4 girls, and it went OK. Two of them definitely have sufficient French ability to do it, but I'm not so sure about the other two. I'll see how it goes. And it turns out there's at least one person here that's better at computers than I am (ans also more educated—he's got a doctorate in Environmental Science)! Not that I'm particularly good at IT, but I'm better than 99% of people here, since they have little to no experience with computers. But this guy knows how to do the tinkering bits involved in the gray startup screen that I don't mess with for fear of royally screwing something up. But anyway, he helped me out with one of the computers, which we've diagnosed as having a ton of relatively harmless viruses, but that nonetheless blocks the antivirus. Which means we need to reinstall the system software. Luckily, he also has the disks, so that'll happen sometime this week, inshallah.   Otherwise, everyone's getting ready for Tabaski, which is in about 10 days. Which means that there are more sheep wandering around than usual (for Tabaski, every household slaughters a ram/sheep/goat to commemorate Abraham's sacrifice), especially in Diaobe. However, fewer sheep than last year. Also fewer people at Diaobe, either due to lack of money (not sure if it's because of the global economic crisis, or because the harvest isn't quite finished yet), or political problems in the Guineas. Either way, far fewer people at the market this year than right before Tabaski last year.

Turns out me having internet at site does decrease email response time, but doesn't increase blogging activity… at least not the past few weeks.  Sorry about that. Life's been going well recently. Work's picking up, so I'm busy, and that's good. School's back in session, and so far fairly strike-free, although I'm expecting that to change in the next week or so as Tabaski approaches. The teachers all want to be able to go home for the big holiday, after all. And strikes are fun for students and teachers, since everyone gets the day off. Meanwhile, I'm spending my "free time" teaching the alphabet to the 3 younger kids in my compound (ages 7-9, I believe), which is becoming a most frustrating task. But somebody's gotta do it, and no one else seems to be stepping up. Definitely a depressing reflection of the Senegalese education system, since these kids have been in school for 1-3 years already, and still can't recognize the letters of the alphabet (although they can sing the ABCs quite well). Granted, French isn't their first language, and there probably are about 50 of them in each class, but still, it stuns me that they're in the equivalent of 1st grade and can't identify the alphabet (not to mention writing it). So I've made them alphabet flashcards and have been devoting an hour + every night to getting them to learn the ABCs. God-willing, they'll have mastered them by Tabaski, which is the 27th or 28th. Or at least by when Mom visits, so they can show off. This has also started a debate on child motivation/discipline. The Senegalese swear by corporal punishment (the teacher smacking palms with a ruler rings true here) both for focus and motivation. I personally disagree, and have so far refrained from hitting any children, despite being encouraged to do so (the kids actually brought me a switch last night and told me to use it). And while Americans tend toward positive reinforcement (good job, try again, you can do it), Senegalese tend toward the negative (you're stupid, how could you possible think that N is M?!). So we have our pedagogical differences. Hopefully, internet classes will start soon. And by soon I mean in January, which is depressing since the other day I found a sign-up sheet I'd written in April. That's about how fast stuff gets done here. Alas. But this time we've set prices, done a little publicity, and I should have access to the computer room this week, so all I need now are students. But no one's going to sign up before the holidays, then I'll be on vacation, so really January would be fantastic. I also have (or at least think I have) an advocate for literacy classes for the girls, namely a visitor from WorldVision Canada who came last week. She think it would make a lot of sense, so hopefully she's convinced the WV people here to fund them. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I went to Diaobe the other day, and while there were a lot of people, there were far less than there were right before Tabaski last year (though still a lot of sheep). Word on the street is it's because there aren't nearly as many Guineans coming to the market, due to the political situation there. I'm not sure how exactly that affects their coming or not—whether it's harder for them to move around in Guinea, or whether the Senegalese border is more strict—but apparently it's deterring trade, which is unfortunate.And the latest village drama is that the local microfinance institution has been going through it's books and getting people to pay back their loans, and arresting those who haven't paid. Which means everyone's short on cash, and the gossip mill is in full swing. I personally don't have much pity for those who don't pay, since they knew very well they were going to have to pay up eventually.

 

I'm posting this from my little village of 5000. This is very exciting-- 256k internet via a mobile device! available from Sonatel for a mere 10.150 CFA. Now that's an exceptional Chinese import. Nice work, Huawei technologies, you're changing my life.

Still no progress on running water or indoor plumbing though...

Tomorrow I will be returning to Kolda, after a week in Dakar. (I had orginally planned on going back today, but since there's a Peace Corps car going tomorrow I decided it was worth staying the extra day.) I finished my Mid-Service Medical Exam, and am all healthy (pending getting results back from the lab). Luckily I don't have TB--otherwise I'd have to be on TB meds for 9 months. I also got to talk to Nicole and Chris a little bit, since I was up here. So it wasn't a total waste of a week (and I'm not complaining about a few trips to N'ice cream, good food, and unlimited AC). I also got to go to Swear-In for the newest group of PCVs, so that was good too. Unfortunately they'll beat Amanda, Maggie and I back to Kolda, so we won't really get to help with shopping and stuff, but there'll be plenty of time to hang out over the next year. Hopefully I'll be back at site Tuesday night or Wednesday morning (inshallah).

As long as I'm in Dakar, I figured I might as well knock off my Mid-Service Medical Exam. Step 1: Dentist. I went to the dentist this afternoon for a checkup and cleaning, and I'm proud to say I have no cavities. The dentist is a French guy who is slightly less tender in his dental practices than my previous American dentists... The scraping thing made a really loud high pitched noise, and he got a couple sensitive spots around my gums that really hurt. But in the end, no cavities! I've got the rest of my Mid-Service Thursday morning, so hopefully they don't find anything drastically wrong with me then.

I also got my second rabies booster shot (this one a much better execution than the previous one), and the PC doctor took a look at the bite area itself. She said it looked fairly normal, and switched me to the more powerful antibiotic Augmentin. So hopefully I should be ok.

Meanwhile, I'm in Dakar through Saturday, hanging out and getting some work done. And enjoying the AC

That said, it's getting better. Here's what happened:

I went for my morning run as usual, and on the way back home I got bit by a dog. It was jogging towards me, bit my calf, and kept going. Very bizarre. Who knows if the dog actually has rabies, but it sure hasn't been vaccinated, and I've heard dogs fighting the past few nights, so I wouldn't bet against it having rabies. It wasn't that bad a bite (broke the skin, now badly bruised and a little swollen, but no chunk of my leg missing), so I walked back home, and called Med. Initially I was supposed to find a way to get to Dakar for a rabies booster within 24 hours, but that's not really feasible. So while they called Tamba and Kolda, I bathed, had breakfast, and went to the pharmacy, which as it turns out, does carry rabies vaccines. So I bought the vaccine (about $23), called Med to tell them, and the guy at the pharmacy gave me the shot (not the best one I've ever had, but I guess it worked). I told my family, packed up my stuff, and headed into Kolda (not the most pleasant trip ever, but I'm here). Once in Kolda, Med put me on Amoxicilin (not their first choice, Augmentin, which had been used last week), and I'll go up to Dakar on Monday and get my second rabies booster on Tuesday, and get my wound checked out. Depending on how busy they are, I might also try to squeeze in my Mid-Service Med Exam.

Now that I'm in Kolda, my day's improving, what with internet, TV, friends and food, but still probably my worst day in Senegal.... But on the upside, I will get to say a final goodbye to Danny and Hans, so there's always a positive spin, I guess. Just as long as I don't get rabies.

My recent profound thought is this (Econ jargon to follow): the fact that pretty much everything here is shared has a negative impact on development because many goods are treated as "public goods" and have lots of positive externalities, so they're undersupplied in the general market (demand is weaker than it should be to achieve the optimal level of that good). In slightly less arcane terms, take the calculator as an example (standard public good example is a traffic light--everyone wants them, nobody wants to pay for them). Pretty much everyone has their own calculator in America (both because you can afford it, and because, let's face it, who wants to share their calculator?). Here, people share calculators, so if your neighbor has a calculator, you can borrow it any time you want, so why would you buy your own calculator when you can borrow his? And vice versa, you know that if you buy a calculator, your neighbor will also use it, so while the utility for you alone isn't sufficient to make you want to buy it, the combined utility is, so you while you should buy the calculator, you don't, because it's not worth it to you personally. Each good has enough positive externalities (positive impact for a non-paying third party) that not enough people have that good. If that makes any sense. Plus since everything's a public good, no one takes care of stuff and it breaks quickly, compounding the problem. Now if someone can just work that into their development economics model...

On a more normal note, this past week in village has been great because people have actually started moving again, after Korité and now that the rains are stopping and school is starting (inshallah). So I've been able to meet with people and get the ball rolling on some projects. One, got a proposal in for a health training for expecting teen mothers, to teach them about family planning, maternal/infant nutrition and general health). Two, we can start organizing this school year at the Case vocational school, complete with new schedule and paying the teachers by class instead of by month (this was a major insight, although not that difficult a concept to come up with), so that teachers that work more get paid more (last year they didn't). I predict that meeting to tell them of the new plan deteriorates into a shouting match. We'll win, but they'll be unhappy about it (the teachers getting paid much less, that is). And three, my grand idea to bring high speed internet to Kkne won't be happening, because ADSL is only available in the city of Kolda (although next time I go to Velingara I'll try to ask them there). But you can get 256k and either buy 1000CFA for 3 hours connection, or pay 18,000 CFA per month for unlimited. So those are both possibilities.

And finally, I posted new pictures on flickr, from Korité, Dimboli, and what it looks like around site during the rainy season.

finally getting stuff done!

Korité (holiday marking the end of Ramadan) was last Sunday, and it's nice to be back to normal life again and not dealing with people who are irritable due to fasting (myself included). I really do enjoy eating lunch. It's actually a little bit weird to start re-factoring lunch into my daily schedule. I "fasted" 18 days (I cheated and drank water). Your body actually gets used to the new routine a lot easier than you'd think. Korité actually came as a little bit of a surprise to me, since I went to sleep Saturday night thinking Korité would be Monday (no one had seen the moon), but then Sunday morning there wasn't any 5 o'clock last call to eat/drink, which meant it was Korité! We had good food, and got all dressed up in the evening (my outfit is quite impressive, if I do say so myself; pics to follow next time I'm in Kolda).

The other good thing about the holidays is the return of all the college kids from Dakar, which means I've had some very intellectually stimulating conversations in village. I've attempted to explain the process that happens to make a law in America (not totally sure, since I haven't done that since at least high school, if not middle school) and the roles of the Senate and House of Representatives. Very intense. Also had some deep religious discussions with a distant relative who's become very religious in the past few years. Including explaining my opinion that John 3:16-21 is the cornerstone of Christianity (I busted out my English Bible and Djiby had a French translation; Did you know that Revelations is called Apocalypse in French?). Very interesting stuff.

I've also been helping Djiby with English, and he's been helping me with Pular. Before I came down to Kedougou I gave him a CD I'd made of American music I like, so I'm interested to see what he/the rest of the family and village think. I'm crossing my fingers it gets disseminated through Kkne and that I can listen to that instead of Akon all the time. I tried to pick songs I don't think I'll get sick of, but chances are I'll be hating some of my favorite songs in a little while.

I recently discovered there's in fact internet in my town. Some random guy on the road has something that's similar to dialup and said if I paid 1000 CFA I could get on for 3 hours. It's apparently a newish deal from Sonatel--someone in Kedougou explained it to me. And the initial cost is only 10,000! I could buy that myself and have internet at the Case! Oh the possibilities...

We recently found out that we'll be helping to blanket the entire Department of Velingara with mosquito nets, which is both exciting and a bit overwhelming. It's supposed to happen in December and January, which is bad timing for a number of reasons, but it'll probably get pushed back a little anyways. Nothing ever goes according to plan here...

I've been down in Kedougou the past few days helping with a health clinic event in a nearby village. The Department of Defense's Humanitarian Assistance Program was running it, and they asked Peace Corps Volunteers to come help out. It was definitely interesting to see, but was also exhausting. I thought we were going to be translating, but we ended up doing more crowd control/ directing traffic/health education/ miscellaneous, which was actually good. My Pular's not good enough to do doctor/patient translating. It was fun to interact with military-esque people, since those personality types don't really exist in Peace Corps. For instance, they had a lot of fun pulling the ferry across the river. So much so that we had a men v. women competition one day. Women won if you count the 30 second handicap--we got 1:41 and they had 1:24. I think the men also had more people pulling.

I think I'm going to head up to Tamba this afternoon, then back to site tomorrow, and possibly in to Kolda sometime in the next week or so. Who knows. Depends on how things are going in the village.

It's weird to be at the year-in-country mark. This time last year I had just gotten here, and this time next year I could be back. I need to stop thinking in terms of time left, because otherwise it'll be a very long year. As is, I think it'll fly by. It's bizarre having this stage leave, but will be exciting to have new people and a new dynamic in the house.

I spent about 3 weeks in village, including day trips to Dabo, Velingara and to Olivia's village to break it up a little. It felt good to put in some village time after having been gone for so long. Unfortunately, there hasn't been much to do in village due to Ramadan, summer vacation, and rain. But it should pick up after Korité and when school starts up again (inshallah).

Ramadan has been interesting. It's remarkable what a change it makes in daily life, and that that was what was "normal" when we arrived a year ago. Definitely not normal. The first few days were very different, and at this point people have found their Ramadan rythym. Most people's daily schedule is: wake up at 5 am and eat leftover dinner from the previous night and/or porridge, pray the morning pray time, go back to sleep until late morning/early afternoon, go to the market/take care of other errands/go to the fields/work, figure out how to kill the rest of the day (napping, Scrabble, talking, cards), sometime around 5 start preparing for breaking the fast/dinner, break fast at sundown (coffee and bread), wait a little while, eat dinner, hang out talking, go to bed, do it all again the next day. I ate the 5 am meal the first 2 days, but my stomach doesn't like it, so I just drink water or have bread or something in my hut instead. The morning call to eat from the mosque is kind of funny. It's in Arabic, so I don't get what htey're saying, except there've been a couple times where in Pulaar they've said "15 minutes left... 10 minutes left..." doing a countdown to when you can't eat or drink anymore. I think it's funny, and so does my family. So far I've "fasted" 13 days. I still drink water, but just don't eat anything (although I've cheated there too a few times). I've talked with a couple other volunteers about it, and we think we've been dreaming more during Ramadan. Maybe a link between fasting and dreaming?

Our compound has gained and lost some people for summer vacation. Bailo went to Dakar, and Agna and Lamine are in Gambia. Meanwhile, Faama is still here from St. Louis, and Uncle Djiby and his daughter Ndeye came down from Dakar for a couple weeks. And Aminata and Ousmane have moved in from across town. So now there are 5 kids under 10, as opposed to the usual 1. Definitely a change in dynamic. Uncle Djiby also adds an intellectual twist, since he's a high school teacher and way more educated than anyone who's usually around. For example, he was asking me specific questions about American politics, and talking about development stuff. Basically, he gets it, which is different. Now that he's gone back to Dakar, my brother Djiby is back in town, so I'll see him when I go back tomorrow.

In village news, someone drowned by the bridge near town. Depending on who you ask, it's either because he couldn't swim or because there's a genie/spirit at the bridge than needs at least one person per year. Last year it needed 4. I personally think the genie did it.

Korité should be in about a week, which will be fun, or as much fun as holidays are here. Getting dressed up and eating good food, essentially. I've had my outfit made, and it's pretty sweet. A pant complet with lots of embroidery. Fabulously ridiculous.

I dropped in on PST for a couple days to help with some culture/language/SED sessions. The new group arrived bright and early Thursday morning, and headed out to their training villages this afternoon for the first time. It's almost a time warp...about the same atmosphere as my stage (although less concerned with where they'll be placed and what languages they'll be learning, and more motivated for language/tech assignments), and the same skits, same sessions, and a lot of the same questions and concerns. Except this time I'm one of the ones with the answers! And there are 3 Mauritanian volunteers, which adds experienced volunteers to the group. That'll be interesting, since they can be resources to their fellow trainees. And there are 2 third years pretty much running some aspects of training (especially coordinating visiting volunteers). Overall, probably an improvement on my stage, so that's good to know.

I got a ride to Kaolack in a Peace Corps car with someone from Peace Corps Washington who's visiting. Hopefully we shared some positive things, and some ideas for improvement. She'll do a little bit of touring around Senegal to volunteers' sites to see a little bit of how we operate and what we're working on.

I just posted some pictures from this past week's Access English Camps (generously sponsored by the US Embassy in Dakar). It was a lot of fun for both Peace Corps Volunteers and campers!

Tomorrow I'm off to Thies to help out a little with training the new volunteers. They arrived yesterday morning, which means I'm now the year-in stage and am supposed to know what I'm doing now. Do I? I think I'm doing some cross-culture sessions, and helping Etienne with his tour of the area surrounding the center (their first trip outside the center, into real Africa! Should be fun/funny).

I do enjoy a good change of pace every now and again....but this has been a little much. Still nice though. I'll be away from my village for about 4 weeks total, but had originally intended to be away for only 2. Oh well. Work's slow for me this time of year anyways, since everyone's busy in the fields.

I'm teaching in Embassy-sponsored English Camps in Dakar this week, which I'd been planning on doing for a while. It's fun--essentially being a camp counselor for a week. The kids are nice, all around 15-16 I think, and their English isn't so hot, but they're generally motivated. They're only 6 months into a 2 year program, so that's to be expected. It's definitely a good change of pace.

The extension of my trip up north was being in Thies for about 10 days working on new language manuals. On a Wednesday, I got a call from Peace Corps saying I'd been invited to Thies for the following Monday. I'd planned on being in Kounkané to wrap up the end of the year at the girls' school, so told them I didn't really want to, but they sort of insisted, so I ended up coming. I guess I had a choice, but that also left me with a week to kill in between the language manuals and the english camps. In the end, I'm glad I came, because I think it'll be useful (maybe someday some volunteers will appreciate it). The first week there were about 5 volunteers, and all the language trainers, and we talked about topics that should be covered, and activities/exercises that would be good for teaching those topics, so that was interesting. We came up with activities and the trainers started writing their manuals. By the end of the week we were kind of burned out. I decided to stay for the second week since I didn't have anything else to be doing, and I figured I could both be useful in Thies and spend way less money than hanging out in Dakar. Plus Dakar was really crowded what with the Health/EE summit and week one of english camps, so it kind of made more sense to stick around. The second week was mostly me working on the French trainee manual, doing formatting and correcting the English and making it look pretty. Not super interesting, but hopefully useful (inshallah). It should be an improvement on the old ones, which were exceptionally poorly organized, and the trainers should be able to teach from the manuals, and trainees will have all the information in one place (as opposed to oodles and oodles of handouts).

The other interesting part of being in Thies was that Peace Corps Mauritania was there. They were originally told they were having their mid-service conference in Senegal (free vacation!) while a security team toured the country. They hung out at the center for about 2 weeks, including a day trip to Lac Rose and Keur Moussa (I tagged along on that one. Lac Rose, not that pink. Keur Moussa, still good, nice mass, tasty goat cheese and bissap wine.). But as of a few days ago, PC Mauritania is no more--it's being suspended. Which means that they're not going back to Mauritania, and all doing their Close of Service stuff in Dakar now. Some are apparently transferring to Uganda or Rwanda, and most are going back to America to look for jobs or look into doing Peace Corps or Crisis Corps elsewhere. That's gotta be rough on them. Although they get to leave Mauritania (it doesn't sound very nice), and get full benefits of 2 years of service after only doing one year. They decided to suspend the program for a combination of reasons: their new training group didn't get visas (no Americans are getting visas right now, period), and an American got killed, and a British guy got kidnapped, and there was a suicide bombing last weekend. So really, no surprise that Peace Corps is leaving. At least not to us south of the border. Some of them were apparently surprised. It was interesting hanging out with them for a few weeks. Good luck back in America!

I also went back to Pout for an afternoon to visit my host family there. It was nice, but a little weird. Hasn't really changed all that much. It was good to see them, and I ate well since I was a guest. I also saw Bamba's brother, which was kind of funny, since he hasn't seen Bamba in 2 months. Bamba's too busy, and he's American now, since he spends all his time with Americans (actually, not true since most of PC staff is Senegalese).

This week has also been nice in Dakar since I've been house/cat-sitting for a volunteer with a really nice apartment. It's big, fully furnished, and has a view of the presidential palace. Also centrally located. Not a bad deal at all. Definitely beats staying at the PC house, although I really don't mind that all that much.

The past couple weeks have been a little bit annoying--either nothing to do, or a lot to do. Nothing to do either because the people I work with haven't been around, or it's rained, or a lot to do because we need to wrap up the end of the year at the vocational school and Khady's leaving for Mampatim (technically, she's supposed to be working there now, but she's going to be back and forth for the next couple weeks). We had her going away party Saturday, and I remain amazed at how nice and gracious everyone can be, when I've seen them fight. I guess it's probably always like that when someone's leaving. There were lots of speeches, which lasted entirely too long, and then sodas.

I wish I could have filmed the meeting to organize the party. It would make a great "how you don't want a meeting to turn out" video. You would think it would just be a benign sort of thing, but it devolved into a yelling match between Sali and Mr. Mané because he wanted the Case to pay for it entirely, and she wasn't having it. Then he challenged her authority, and it was kind of downhill from there. Everyone (myself included) thought she was being ridiculous. They finally agreed to split the cost. My mom just gets wrapped up in these conspiracy plots against her, which I think are totally made up, but maybe I'm being naive because everyone seems to be very wary of other people trying to usurp their power.

A volunteer who was in Kounkané about 15 years ago came back to visit. Emily and I talked with her one afternoon, and it was kind of interesting to hear what's changed and what hasn't. She also brought peanut M&Ms for some of the kids, which they thought were really good. They were calling them "American peanuts" which isn't totally accurate.

My compound got another guest from St. Louis, Kinné's older sister Faama. She's probably about 9, although I'm bad with telling kids' ages. The difference in personality is quite remarkable. Kinné is very extroverted, while Faama is really quiet. I think Faama likes me, or is at least curious, but she doesn't really say anything, and we don't really share a language, so who knows. I wonder how long she'll be around.

I've had a realization about part of why Pulaar is so difficult (at least for me). The parts of speech don't line up with English. When learning French, it also had nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, articles, etc., but Pulaar doesn't really. There are some words that are clearly nouns or verbs, but the line between verbs and adjectives is very fuzzy, and then there are words that defy categorization, like "ko" and "no". Ko is sort of like "it is" but can also be used as "that" so it's ambiguous. No sort of indicates a state of something ("no wuli"= it's hot), but again, very ambiguous. If you're interested, you can download my Pular book, Mido Waawi Pular.

End of year exams have been happening for those ending middle school and high school. Bouba Ndiaye got his baccalaureat, so that's exciting. It's his third try, and he barely missed it the other two times. He's really smart, so I'm happy for him. He should be going on to university in Dakar. Everyone more or less agrees that you can buy diplomas if you want to. For instance, for the end of middle school diploma (BFEM), they were talking about some people paying the exam graders to give them passing grades, or even just having influential people go and intervene on their behalf. Or the suggestion that NDeye didn't even have to study because her dad's an inspector at the school so shes sure to get it anyways. This despite a system where everyone gets a number so the graders can't see the name. But if you tell them your number, they can always help you out! Makes me wonder how many people in Senegal actually deserve their diplomas.

Saturday WorldVision opened a resource center in town, so had a party and offered free AIDS testing. It was interesting to watch the AIDS testing (they had a rapid test), because it seemed to be the cool thing to do. All the teenagers were doing it (everyone I saw came out negative), and some adults. Not quite the same ambiance as AIDS testing in America.

Saturday there was also some sort of big basketball game and party. I don't know exactly what it was, but I think I've gotten myself into being patronness of basketball in Kounkané. I haven't heard anything from Hedrick about basketball projets in a while, but suggested to the club that they write him a letter that I would take to Dakar with me in August. I figure there's some chance that project is still going on, and if not, I may do a Peace Corps Partnership or SPA grant for improvements to the court and possibly try to organize a basketball/health/life skills camp for back to school time. We shall see.

Pictures, and a few movies, are up on Flickr.

*Pictures will be posted on Flickr the next time I'm in Kolda*

Also, check out the virtual Peace Corps game...kinda sorta like being a real Peace Corps Volunteer!

First, news from the village: Since the rainy season's here, flip-flops are not always the ideal shoe. So the other day after it rained, I busted out my Crocs (bright blue, standard Crocs design, thanks Sandy!). Turns out villagers are just as polarized by Crocs as Americans. Some kids pointed laughed as I walked by, some girls told me they liked them, others told me I would be laughed at if I ever wore them to a large group event. Whatever--they beat flip-flops for walking through the mud.

Work is...interesting, for the moment. I'm surprised the school's still going on (I was sure it would fall apart mid-June), but Khady's been posted to Mampatim, so she'll be leaving us, so there goes most of the day-to-day organization, and the liaison with WorldVision. Inshallah, someone to replace her. Otherwise, the whole thing really will fall apart. Permanently. Also, we've counted 7 girls that are now pregnant. Luckily, most of them are old enough to be pregnant (around 18), not dangerously young (under 16). But I'm pretty sure none of them are married, so that's kind of depressing. How is there not enough social pressure not to get pregnant?? Alas, such is life in this corner of Senegal. I did try out a money management game (Making Cents) that went over reasonably well. 2 of the 7 girls present got really into it, and finally "won" on the third try (this involved staying in class an extra 15 minutes, so they were actually very interested). The others mostly just worked on their crochet, but that's fine for the first time. As long as some people get something out of it.

As I'm sure everyone knows at this point, Michael Jackson died. I heard about it on BBC, then was informed by Senegalese multiple times during the day. Then we watched a couple retrospectives, one a concert he did in Budapest (I assume it's the only one RTS could get rights to broadcast), and another a compilation of music videos from the Thriller album. Fantastic! His legs look like they're made of elastic (said Ndeye).

Usually there are no Baye Falls (annoying religiously-affiliated beggars with dreads) in Kounkane, but recently there was one (or two?). Turns out Senegalese dislike them just as much as I do. I was sitting at my mom's boutique with Dienaba, and one came by. Once he finished talking to use, we talked about how obnoxious they are. Also, he's got his high school diploma, so he speaks decent French and English, so he could actually do something productive with his life. But no....all he does is bother people and beg. Dienaba said even if she had a lot of money, she would never ever give to Baye Falls. Take that!

I came down to Kedougou a few days before the Fourth so I could go see the Dindefelo waterfalls. We left one day around 3:30, leaving plenty of time for a 30 km bike ride before dark. Or so we thought. Someone got a really bad flat tire that took an hour to fix, then we got stuck in a nasty storm (at least the tropical storm-force winds were at our backs), with really strong winds and rain. By the time it stopped it was dark out, so we ended up half biking, half walking the last 5 km from Segou to Dindefelo. It was interesting, considering there were 3 headlamps between the 9 of us. We were quite the sight as we rolled into the campement at 9:15, dirty, wet, hungry, cold and exhausted. So we bathed, got warm, ate, and crashed. Quite the adventure.

It was worth the trip though. The waterfalls were beautiful, coming off cliffs that are by far the highest I've seen in a while. And we could swim in the pool at the bottom. It was fun. Half the group left in the afternoon, and me and Daniel and Erin hiked up the mountain, where there was a fabulous view, and strange-looking mushroom-shaped termite mounds. We spent the night at the campement and biked back the next morning. The way back only took 2 1/2 hours. It was kind of amazing how close everything was!

We had a day to recover at the pool, and everyone else got there from other parts of Senegal. Then there was a 4th of July less-than-5k run the morning of the 4th, which was a success. I didn't run (I didn't bring my shoes), but I was there to take pictures and enjoy the music. Most of the runners were Senegalese policemen or soccer players, but a decent number of PCVs participated as well. After that, everyone headed to the Kedougou house for the party. The party on the 4th was a lot of fun. Lots of people, lots of food (including 2 roast pigs, properly butchered by some highly skilled Peace Corps Volunteers), a few fireworks, and Bassari dancers that kind of caught everyone off guard. And good music. A nice little mini-vacation. I think I'll go back to site tomorrow.

I'm back in Kolda to recharge (email, mail, etc.) for a day and a half after having been in the village for a little over a week. Culturally, the readjustment wasn't that bad. But my body was telling (forcing) me to sleep a lot. Either I was sleep deprived before (entirely possible, not sleeping well in Dakar or Kolda), or it was something I ate, or generally what I was eating, or something, but I was slept a LOT for a few days, including passing out for a couple hours 2 afternoons. Luckily, that's totally OK here.

The gifts I brought back were generally a success. Pens and dictionaries were appreciated, as were squirt guns. Bubble wands were interesting--they didn't know what they were (perfume?), and then when I demonstrated, the smaller children ran away from the bubbles. Very bizarre, since American kids have a tendency to run toward the bubbles, trying to pop them. Oh well. Lotion was also a hit.

Work's pretty slow now, either because I've been gone for a while and don't have anythign on my agenda, or because the rains are starting so everyone else is busy farming. Or a combination, most likely. Some days it's kind of nice just to be able to chill, but I've also been feeling a little out of sorts, lost not knowing what to do exactly. And my mom's been out of town (wedding in Mbour, funeral in Velingara), so that takes part of my routine away. I'm gonna try to get Garden 2.0 going this week before I go to Kedougou for the 4th of July, since Garden 1.0 failed due to chickens eating it, or so I'm told. Maybe this'll do better, since I won't really have to water it.

The rains are really a force of nature. Probably enhanced by the unpredictability of them (would they be as unpredictable if there was a Weather Channel/Radar?). The winds get going, then the rain comes. But sometimes the wind's a false alarm. And there's a ton of heat lightning every night. It seems like more people get struck by lightning here than in America, but that could just be because people spread more rumors. Who knows. I did feel a little ridiculous explaining how lightning rods work (toubabs are soooo smart!). Yeah...Ben Franklin figured that out over 200 years ago...but I guess they don't have kites here. Still, you would think that would be common knowledge. To be fair, both WorldVision and the cell phone tower both apparently DO have lightning rods. Amazing.

I was, in turn, impressed by a couple things I learned watching women make soap. 1) There is a certain kind of soap that you can only stir in one direction. If you change directions, it will spoil. This is apparently also true of mayonnaise. I'm skeptical. 2) Putting vineagar on you will prevent you from being burned by caustic soda (lye). I guess it makes chemical sense, in small quantities at least.

I read a couple of articles (from the SED APCD) on culture and business. It was interesting, but a little depressing since it made my work here seem like even more of an uphill battle. Best to know what you're up against, I guess. One of the more pertinent observations was that Africans share things and money, but hoard knowledge. Westerners hoard things and money, but share knowledge. So basically, if I have something you want/need, here you're more or less expected to ask for it, and if you ask, I'm obligated to give it to you (bike, money, pen, whatever). And there's no shame in asking, even if you get turned down. Ergo, everyone ends up on the same level economically, because hoarding/accumulation is frowned upon. But information doesn't necessarily get passed freely, whether it's about when and where a meeting is, or how to do a certain thing. Whereas in the West, sharing information (in my opinion, at least), makes someone better off, and no one worse off (Pareto efficiency!), and besides, assymetries of information are bad (less efficient). Ah, economic theory... Anyway, it's by far the most academic thing I've read in the past year, and definitely explains some of the bizarro situations I encounter.

On the off chance you're interested (I couldn't find it for free online...):

Buckley, Graeme: Superstitions, the family and values in microenterprise development

Small Enterprise Development, Volume 7, Number 4, December 1996 , pp. 13-21(9).

I spent a few more days in Dakar than I’d originally planned, mostly since there was an Artisans’ Expo this weekend that a lot of people from my stage were involved in (having a ton of friends in Dakar is a GREAT way to come back to America). I ended up adopting two Pulaar women who came from a village near Tamba who didn’t speak any Wolof. They also didn’t have a place to stay, since the person they knew in Dakar fell through. So I called my extended host family in Dakar, and they stayed with them. Ah, teranga in action. That’s a pretty distant connection—friend of friend of extended family member. And they were still welcomed more or less with open arms. They were very village. One of them had trouble crossing the street, so Djiby had to hold her hand. I also think they had their first experience with Western toilets. They were selling bracelets, and did pretty well. But they really wanted to get home—it was kind of cute. When I asked them when they wanted to go home, they said "now." I hope they got home ok. I think they should have. They gave their money to Jess Young to take back to Tamba, since they were afraid to carry that much ($50-100). That and they probably didn’t want to come back to the village with all that money, and the other women would probably think they already skimmed off the top. It was quite an experience, and a little more quickly into work/Senegalese life than I was expecting. The stuff at the expo was pretty nice, too. I got a couple bags, and a wooden turtle and a bracelet. We also wore ourselves out playing a lot of volleyball in the afternoons (some of the artisans think it's what we do every day after lunch, sort of like how they drink tea).

Monday was more relaxing—went to my doctor’s appointment and my skin thing’s more or less gone, so they gave me more antibacterial soap and Hibiclens and baby powder and told me to just keep super clean. Should be a bit of a challenge during the rainy season. Other than that, I had a good last day in Dakar. Went to the office, hung out at the American Club, went downtown and got ice cream, went to Chinese food. Then crashed, got up at the crack of dawn to catch a Peace Corps car down to Kaolack, where I then waited 3 1/2 hours at the garage till the car would leave (when I paid the driver 2 mille so we could just leave). Other than the long layover in the Kaolack garage, the trip went pretty smoothly and I got back to Kolda around 8.

Quote of the day from Monday goes to Candice: "We just split a $3 cab ride 5 ways." Yes, we did. 300 CFA per person.

Now I'll have a couple days in Kolda to reassemble my life before going back to the village Friday or Saturday.

I'm back in Senegal (in Dakar for a few days before heading back down south). There are a lot of people here, especially from my training group, due to the SED summit that I missed and the artisan/ecotourism expo this weekend. It's really nice since now I get to catch up with friends! Definitely a good way to come back to country.

As it turns out, traveling can be complicated in America, too, just not in the same way as it is in Senegal. I had a bit of a flight fiasco trying to get on the plane to come back. Since someone (Expedia or Delta) had changed my flight to going direct from Atlanta, rather than through New York, and had neglected to reissue my ticket, I very nearly missed my flight. I got to the airport 2 hours early, like I was supposed to, but apparently you can't use the kiosks if you're flying to Africa, so we had to stand in a very long International Check-In line. So with 5 minutes before the flight closed, I was given the choice between paying a large penalty fee and getting on the flight, or calling Expedia and trying to get them to work it out. Thankfully Dad paid the penalty and I literally ran through the airport to the gate (they'd only just started boarding, so it was fine), and made the flight. Alhamdoulilah. And the story actually does end well, since Delta ultimately reimbursed Dad since it was their mistake.

We'd also bumped into a Pulaar family in the Atlanta airport, which was fun. They, too, had issues at check-in, since they didn't physically have a ticket for their baby. I guess you need one if you're crossing borders? Anyway, they were nice enough, and it was sort of fun to see Pulaars in America. I guess it's probably not that unusual on a flight to Dakar.

The night before I left, Dad and I went to a Cubs-Braves game, which was an excellent game. Cubs pitched a no-hitter through 6 (I think), then the Braves rallied to come back, Francoeur hit a homer in the bottom of the 9th to tie it, and the Braves ended up winning in 11 innings. Good game, and good finale for my vacation.

Taco Stand ended up being both my first and last meals in America. The BBQ pork taco and Fried Chicken taco really hit the spot. You can't get Mexican food in Senegal (unless you make it yourself).

It was a really good vacation, but could have been a couple days longer (it's probably like that no matter how long you're there). I got to see most of my family (including Baby Jack!), and Jen came down for a few days, which was really nice. It was a lot of traveling, but also a lot of fun and good food, and 2 Braves games. I also managed to get some stuff for people back in Senegal (a router for the house, squirt guns, bubbles, knives, volleyballs, and various other things for people in the village), so overall I'd say it was short and sweet. Not quite long enough, but sufficient nonetheless.

I'm baaaack. Not for long--just 2 weeks. I got in last night after 26 (self-imposed) hours of travel. I left Dakar around 11 pm on a flight to Paris. They sprayed insectide on the plane before it took off...I guess there's dangerous stuff in Africa (actually, probably malaria mosquitos, now that I think about it). It was approved by some health organization or another, which is more than you can say for most of the pesticides in Senegal. I definitely savored the lamb ratatouille plane food, prompting more than a little worry about what that means about what I've been eating for the past 8 months...But that was the only plane food I savored, so I think it says something about the quality of AirFrance's plane food. Or at least that's how I'll read it. I got myself a 10 hour layover in Paris, so I could run around Paris for a few hours. Totally worth it. I took the RER B down to Port Royal, got there before 8 am, walked through the Luxembourg Gardens, past my old apartment, across the Pont des Arts, through the Cour Carré of the Louvre, by the Pyramid, then along the Seine over to the Pont Neuf, to Notre Dame. I went to the 8:30 mass for Ascension, then had breakfast at a café nearby (sadly he gave me a café americano, not espresso with my croissant and orange juice). I walked along the Ile-St-Louis, then along Rue de Rivoli to Place des Vosges, back down Rue des Francs-Bourgeois (oh how I love Paris window shopping!), a few turns to get to Mariage Frères, where I got Mom some tea (special request). By then it was only 10:45, so I skipped l'As du Falafel, walked by the Pompidou, sat down and watched people for a little bit. There was the world's longest line for the Pompidou library, snaking around all the way to the museum side! Kids studying for the bac, from the looks of it. Then I walked over to Hotel de Ville and debated eating in a café or heading back to the airport, since it was about noon. I had told myself I'd be on a train by 1. I just grabbed a quiche and chocolate macaroon to go from Paul (bakery) in Les Halles, and got back to the airport before 1. Then waited in the fancy new international terminal till my flight left around 4. It was a long 10 hour flight. I napped, watched Last Chance Harvey (not very good), Gran Torino (excellent), and Marley and Me (good). That still left a few hours of boredom and napping at the end. I got in, saw Dad and Paul, got my bag pretty quickly, and we went to Taco Stand for chips, Fried Chicken Taco, BBQ Taco, and a margarita. Then came back to the house, where Celia, Katie and Sarah were waiting, and played on the new Wii before crashing.

I’ll be home in under a week! I’m psyched, but it still seems absurdly far away, more so in distance than time (ok, makes perfect sense…). But just thinking about the physical journey seems absurd. It’s been over 8 months since I’ve been on a plane, and imagining the interior is bizarre. As is the concept of going through customs, getting on the airport shuttle, and up the really long escalators. I don’t think there are any shuttle/metros or escalators in this country! And what if I filmed that and showed it to my host family. It would blow their minds.

I’m in Kolda now—I got here yesterday morning for the regional meeting. It was actually relatively painless. We finished just after lunch, whereas it was supposed to be a 2 day affair. Granted, we’ve got a lot of data collecting to do before our next meeting, whenever that is. But we have a plan!

We followed up the meeting with a trip to the pool. It was pretty awesome. Cool water’s the perfect remedy for really freakin hot weather. Definitely a good time.

The past couple weeks in Kounkané I perfected mango drying. The first round turned black, which was disappointing, but round 2 was a success. I was pleasantly surprised with the fact that is worked on the second try. Khady’s gonna continue to do it while I’m gone. I hope the rainy season doesn’t come too soon, although it did apparently rain yesterday and got in the dryer. Potential problem. But people do seem to like them, so I think it could work. And we could also do papayas, bananas, and possibly Moringa leaves. Inshallah.

Awa came and talked to my girls, which was really good. We watched Elle Travaille, Elle Vit!, a Peace Corps movie about why girls should stay in school, which was not quite as big a success. Awa got the girls talking, and thinking about what they’re doing now can impact their future, and where they want to be in 10 years. A high-quality discussion. Also relieving to see that she also had crowd control issues with them, because if anyone could control it it would be Awa. So that makes me feel better about they talking while I’m teaching. Even though she had twice as many people to deal with. Pictures

I also learned that neem lotion kills mice that eat it. One ate some of a bag in Sali’s boutique and died. Good to know.

I’ve also discovered that I can actually bike in a wrap skirt. The main difficulty is just getting on the bike—getting off isn’t really that hard. It’s just a little awkward.

We finally planted the garden the other day. I hope they actually water it and that nothing eats the plants. If all I've gotta do when I get back is weed, I'll call it a win.

I also think my circulation’s getting worse. I’m blaming Mefloquine. My extremities go to sleep ridiculously quickly. As long as it’s not permanent.

The last week went by really slowly, mostly because I’ve been counting down to going home. Hopefully the next week will go a little more quickly. I’ll be in Kolda till I go up to Dakar Sunday or Monday. All downhill from here!

So to finish up on my Kedougou trip, before moving on to more recent things since Easter Break... I went to see Mamadou Yalti Golle live and in concert. It was pretty fun. Steve got up and wowed everyone with his Pulaar skills, then Kevin and I got called up there and didn't do quite as well, but passable. Managed at least to get a Peace Corps shout-out about how we bother to learn the local languages, so that was cool. Also tried salsa-ing to Senegalese music with Steve's friend who's teaching in Ecuador. That was fun. A little cultural exchange--probably introduced a new concept to Senegalese dance. They also did an anti-AIDS skit, which we were all big fans of. Actually a pretty decent idea to integrate skits into popular concerts...maybe we should try to do more of that.

I jinxed myself on the way back from Kedougou--heading out of the garage I was thinking it'd been a while since I'd broken down, and then we broke down about an hour outside Tamba, and had to get in a van for the rest of the way. Actually not substantially worse. Still, I should stop thinking about that stuff and hence jinxing myself. In Tamba there was a kid selling kola nuts that really made me sad--probably 10 or 12 years old, falling asleep in his chair selling stuff. He did give me a thumbs up when he nodded awake, which was good, but still, I felt really sad for him. Actually doesn't happen that often here, but just watching him for a little bit pulled at my heartstrings. Wish I woulda gotten a picture, but I don't pull out my camera in garages.

I've been busy in work-related stuff, teaching costing, then supply and demand to my girls, setting up a tutoring program for kids doing the exam to get from primary to middle school, commissioned a mango dryer that should be ready in the next couple days, and starting a garden in my compound. And I've gotta make some headway in all those projects in the next couple weeks before going to America so they don't totally fall apart in the short time I'm gone...

I recently read an Economist article about the merits of Brazilian telenovelas, as far as women's empowerment and reducing fertility rates. Who knew something so dumb could actually have merit??

I also think you could actually watch paint dry here and have it be halfway entertaining. Partly because there's not a whole lot of entertainment, but also because you can literally watch water evaporate really quickly on the cement of the latrine when washing your hands. Really quite remarkable. The other day it was a high of 110 in the shade, 120 in the sun, and 15% humidity, according to my thermometer. And just a year ago I was wondering why in the world people would actually live somewhere that hot where it doesn't rain for 8-9 months. And now I am that person.

My host brother Ousmane got married last weekend (pictures), which was insane as far as weddings go. I have zero desire to be a Senegalese bride--arriving wrapped in a sheet, swarmed by loud people you don't know and can't see well? No thank you. I think it's pretty close to my personal hell. It was basically concert-loud music blasting in front of my hut for 48 hours, and involved the closest I've come to a nervous breakdown in country when the music stopped at 3 am one night and started back up at 6:45 the next morning. Seriously???? Who does that? Since I clearly wasn't going to sleep thanks to the base thumping I went on a walk, then went to Emily's in the afternoon to sleep since that didn't happen the night before. I just couldn't deal with that. I think I did miss the main vow-exchanging part of the event, though, since there were a bucnh of pictures from when I wasn't there, and the other big events were the bride arriving at 1 in the morning, and me going to greet the newlyweds the next morning. Whatever. No one told me I had to stay, or that anything different was going to be happening. I mean, after 40 hours of loud music and sporatic dancing, would you really think anything was going to change? That and it was ridiculously hot, as usual here.

My host mom's got a scary Medusa-esque hairdo for the wedding, which is all the rage now. Me and all my sisters and other close women friends and relatives got matching dresses, which was kind of fun. The girl cousins all dressed up as boys and did most of the work (cooking, cleaning, serving people). One of them looked like Robin Hood, which was fun. The sheep ate some of the lacciri as it was laying out to dry (totally sanitary, of course), and Fatimata hid most of the family's bowls behind my hut to prevent thieves from stealing them. Apparently all the ones that weren't hidden behind my hut disappeared. So people come to weddings to steal kitchenware. Who knew? It was an interesting experience, but I definitely like American weddings better, and could probably do without the hearing loss. I also learned that one of my namesakes has a kid, which was unexpected (and her husband has a pet monkey, even more surprising), and that my uncle has a second wife (made all the more awkward when someone introduced me to her as his second wife and I didn't believe him because people joke about this being my wife all the time and not being serious. One more reason not to joke about that stuff...)

I also had an interesting discussion with my brothers about tying ties (they only sort of know how to, and not when the tie's around their necks, and dont' like it because it's too tight. Probably the most hilarious/questionable moment of the wedding was my "little sister"/grea-aunt Kadiatou stealing a 2 year old girl's lollipop. The little girl was just walking around, Kadiatou told her to come over, took her lollipop and started licking it exaggeratedly. Clearly the girl started to cry, but granny just kept on going with it. It was kind of funny (I had to suppress laughter), but also made me wonder if there was something wrong with me for laughing at that. I mean, can you imagine your grandmother stealing candy from a small child?? That's just plain mean. Who'd do that to a kid? Maama Kadiatou, that's who!

I was sort of confused when my family was asking me if I'd "lootike fotoji" (washed pictures) of the wedding. Apparently they use the verb to wash for developing pictures, a relic of the good ole days of 35 mm film and such. Really confused me why they weren't talking about printing pictures or some such thing. No, I haven't washed my pictures yet...

I bought some bamboo fencing for a garden in my compound (which will be fenced off by the time I get back Wednesday, inshallah). During the wedding, the fencing was used for 1) a makeshift dancefloor (clearly good for it...), 2) shade for the cooking area, and 3) drying clothes. I'm glad it's so multipurpose...just as long as it eventually ends up preventing animals from eating the garden.

Djiby brought a couple movies down from Dakar with him, one of which was Slumdog Millionaire. I got really excited about it. So one night we started watching it, got about 5 minutes in, to where the cops start chasing the kids through the streets, then it was dinner time, so we stopped it, and everyone said the film was no good! I was outraged. I was starting to get into it, plus it won best film for last year! How dare they say it's bad?! No taste! No culture! So after dinner they put in some dumb kung fu movie with no plot and I went in my hut, sulked, and read the Economist and listened to the Slumdog soundtrack on my iPod. Granted, they probably didn't understand the French dubbing, and the plot line is just a tad more complex than a kung fu movie or soap opera...but still, it's such a good movie!

I've come to the realization that this is my longest time without a plane ride in as long as I can remember. By the time I fly home in under a month (yay!!!), it will have been 8 months and 9 days. Considering I've been flying to school for 6 years, it's been at least that long. I'd have to look at family vacations to actually figure out how long it's been since I've gone 8 months without getting on a plane, and it's not worth the effort, but it's been a while. So it'll be a huge thrill when I get on that plane in a little over 3 weeks!! (Can you tell I'm getting excited?)

I got to Kedougou Thursday afternoon, hung out for a bit, then Friday went to the market (main attraction: avocados!), went to the Relais for a warthog sandwich, got some ice cream at the newly-discovered/established ice cream joint, and biked out to Sheila's village of Thiabedji, about 35 km from Kedougou into the hilly brush. It's really pretty, but the hills were quite difficult for someone accustomed to flatness (like me). It was especially nice biking into the sunset. Also neat how it's still mostly forest, as opposed to the farmland around me. I more or less crashed after dinner since I was beat, then we went for a walk up a hill for a nice view the next morning. I can't say I really got a feel for her village, since I mostly just saw her compound, but they seemed really nice, and the Pulaar's not so different, although their word choice is a little different. I can say I'm glad to be on the road, and close to other people, because I don't know how I'd feel about a 35 km bikeride every time I wanted to come into the regional house. I'd prefer my 2 hour ride in Aliou's sept-place, thank you. I'm also thankful for the electricity, running water, and wifi at Kolda house...

Today I went to mass with Hayes, which was great. The music was really awesome, and in many languages. For the most part it was the French priest giving the mass (I assume he's French since he's white and speaks French...), then being translated into Bassari, which is a local language I'd not heard before. It sounds pretty cool-more clicky than Wolof or Pulaar. And I think my favorite song was actually the one in Wolof. It had a really cool male/female dichotomy going on. Not sure what the technical term for that is. The music was by far the best part--very moving. And the priest even managed to get in the "you should come to church more often, not just Easter" schpeel. Targeting specifically at the parents who brought their kids today, but not on a regular basis. Although the child to parent ratio was way high, so I'm not sure if some kids just came by themselves and the parents stayed at home? That would be weird.

We got sandwiches from the Nigerian meat man, then went to the Relais for some swimming, then ice cream, to the internet café, and tonight we'll go see Mamadou Yalti Golle, who we actually saw at the pool this afternoon. Probably the most famous Pulaar singer in Pulaarland. Should be a good time. Then tomorrow morning I'll head back to Kounkané, for a week of wedding preparation craziness. Definitely glad I had a few days to get away, because that'll be really intense. Also, I have some great pictures that I'll upload in 2 weeks, since I'm at an internet café and don't have my camera to computer cable with me.

I'm down in Kedougou for a few days for Easter--left this morning at 7:30, got here around 4. Went through Velingara, then Tamba, then here. Not too too bad--the roads are better than the Senegalese average. Not really sure what I'll be doing tomorrow, but I think Saturday I'll go visit Sheila's village, be back in Kedougou-city on Sunday and go back Monday.

Then it'll be a crazy week or so in Kounkané--my host brother Ousmane's getting married on the 19th, and I think there'll just be a ton of people in my compound for a while. My tokora--homonym--has been visiting from St Louis with her daughter and newborn. She's not a fan of the village. I think she'll probably leave right after the wedding. Her daughter's about 5 or 6 and it's been funny watching her run around with Amadou because she's such a city girl. Really no good at the roll the bike tire game, or chasing sheep out of the compound. And definitely spoiled. And only speaks Wolof. Still amusing.

Other than that, it's been kind of slow since it's Easter Vacation so a lot of people are traveling. My mom's still negociating her political post...I got a table made...and commissioned a solar dryer. And am working on fool-proofing accounting for the Women's Center, which is currently a nightmare.

Mostly just an FYI post--I'll try to write more over the next few days, but if not, it'll be another week or two.

The name for when it rains during the dry season is "pluit des mangues", or mango rains. It did that Friday morning. And by rain I mean spitting. For maybe 5 minutes. Still, it's water falling from the sky, which I hadn't seen in a while, so it's kind of exciting. It's also been very windy the past couple days, especially at night. And hot. Very hot. (you know it's hot when the tub of margarine starts melting...) Although tellingly, I've been adapting, since I've shivered when it's been 80 and windy. We'll see how that A/C works out when I'm home.

As far as work goes, I'd say I've been having moderate success. I've continued teaching my business classes. Last week I took the hardline approach when they didn't respond at all to the "what did we talk about last week?" question, and I went down the list of names and asked everyone to name one thing they learned. I think I gained a little respect. Then this week we made neem lotion, which I still have high hopes for. We gave everyone a sample and asked them to try it. I'm going to try it when I sleep on the roof in Kolda the next couple nights. I really hope it works. Then I also need to type up labels while I'm here, and next week I'll go try to pitch the product to the pharmacy and health post. And try to work out how much we should sell it for. I'm going to shoot for twice cost. I think it can work. Although I think convincing them to sell it for twice cost is probably the biggest challenge. I worked out the costs on the soap they've been selling for 200 CFA, and each bar costs 192.5, not including labor or utilities. So they're losing money. But since WorldVision's paying for the materials, they don't see the loss. Once again, why Senegal is poor. Because they have profit margins of 0. I'm going to try to get them to sell for 275, or at least 250. Other than this, the cheapest soap is 300, so they shouldn't lose any volume as long as they're under 300.

Dioulde told me a "joke" about why Africa's underdeveloped: A white guy and a black guy (African) go to talk to God. God asks the white guy what he wants, and he says "Everything. I want money, power, knowledge. Everything." God says OK and grants his request. Then God turns to the African and asks him what he wants. The African replies, "I just want to accompany him," indicating the white guy. Which is why the West is developed and Africa lags behind. Would be funnier if it weren't quite so plausible.

Last Saturday I spent the night in Linguéwal (Evelina's village) and went to a meeting of her garden committee to try to work out how they'd manage their money. I don't think my presence was entirely necessary, but it's nice to visit other people's villages every once in a while. Then Sunday we biked out to Sare Habadou (Ben's village) and spent the day there. When we got there, his host dad brought a duck into Ben's hut and announced that they would kill it for us, since we were guests. We tried to say it wasn't necessary, but then they said they'd just find a box so we could tie it to our bikes and take it with us. We certainly weren't about to do that, so we said we'd just have it for lunch. While this conversation was going on, the duck was pooping on Ben's floor (literally scared shitless, I suppose), which we noticed but his host dad did not. When he did notice it, he asked for a broom, but Ben was going to go for the toilet paper to wipe it up. His dad tossed some dirt on the poop, and swept it out the door. One way to clean up... And I must say the duck was quite tasty!

Last Sunday was also municipal elections in Senegal. I think they turned out the best way possible--my mom's party (also the president's party--Sopi) won in Kounkané, so she'll be a counselor to the mayor (as will most of the people I work with), and lost miserably in most of the rest of Senegal, most notably in Dakar. Macky Sall's splinter party did quite well. So basically this is Senegal saying, "Enough of this slow shift towards authoritan government and trying to put your sun in power!" A victory for democracy, if you ask me. Hooray democracy! Also tellingly, there was a power outage the night after the elections (probably a coincidence), and 0 results coverage the night after that--just that they'd finished counting the ballots. Gotta love a free and impartial press!

Friday night the mosque moved into my compound, speakers and all. I think they rotate where they do this every week, and this was my lucky week. Lots of kids chanting/singing along with the loudspeakers. Fabulous. But not quite as horrible as I thought it was going to be. The singing would actually be kind of pleasant if the volume was a little lower. So I stuck in my earplugs and slept decently well.

Also random stuff seen in Senegal: my aunt Ousseye recently acquired a beaded UGA changepurse. A long way from Athens, GA to Kounkané...

I'm in Kolda through Tuesday for a going-away party for the COS-ers, and to welcome the newbies who are coming down on site visit.

Yesterday the boys bought and killed a pig for St. Patrick's Day. It was apparently relatively gruesome, so I'm glad I missed it. I'll spare you the details. We had pulled pork and coleslaw and carrots, and coconut cake (thanks!), which was a big hit. I'd say it was a successful St. Patrick's Day. We had a reasonably useful/effecient regional meeting that covered most of what needed to be covered, and party in the evening. And the boys got to play poker. Always fun.

Today's been a remarkably productive day in Kolda--I managed to finalize the order on the chairs for the house, go to the tailor and order the cloth for them, finish up emailing, AND I'll still go back to the tailor and pick up my dress and skirt in a bit. I reeeaally hope it fits. I also have such high hopes for stuff, which steadily diminish even as he's taking my measurements. You would think that if they took your measurements, they would be able to get it to fit right, yes? But not always. Alas.

There was an article in a recent Economist about Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade and how people don't necessarily like his large public works projects (although the Corniche is quite nice, a large portion of the population doesn't have electricity, running water, or proper latrines), and mentioned that North Korea is building a large statue called "Africa's Renaissance" near the Corniche, which I've noticed on the way to the Peace Corps office. But hang on--North Korea??

1) Since when did North Korea have enough money to give aid to other countries?

2) Isn't Senegal better off than North Korea?

3) What did North Korea get in return?

4) I did think that statue looked a little Communist. I'll have to get a closer look at the faces and see if they look more Senegalese or North Korean...

*North Korea may or may not be funding it, but it's "being built by North Koreans." Which raises some more questions, like if Senegal's paying for it, why aren't Senegalese building it? It can't require that much advanced technology!

Municipal elections are coming up on Sunday and I will be SO happy when they're done. Apparently Karim Wade (son of Abdoulaye) is running for mayor of Dakar. I bet he'll win, unless there's a really big name from the opposition running against him. Ah, semi-democratic elections (if only because voter turnout is probably abysmal because people don't really care and don't bother to even pick up their Voter ID cards even if they're registered). And the slow march to the Presidential Palace in 2012 is underway...

So now I'm just hanging out till Demba gets here and I can bum a ride back to site. And converting Man on Wire so I can watch it on my iPod tonight or tomorrow! Oh how I love technology:D

I'm really excited about my solar dryer, which I can hopefully get built in the next week or so. I also want a table for my hut. I shall have mass quantities of dried mangos, inshallah. And it shouldn't be tooo complicated. Just hope it works. It'll be a fun little experiment/side project that makes everyone think I'm a mad scientist. Muahaha.

As usual, I've had another relaxing few days in Kolda (and a couple more to come). Yesterday I continued getting caught up on email and interneting, and went to the pool at the Hotel Hobbe in the afternoon. It was nice, with the exception of the French hunters in Speedos...no one needs to see that. Also watched some Office, 30 Rock, and the John Stewart/Jim Cramer interview on the Daily Show. Awkward...and it's not like it's Cramer's fault the economy's gone to hell. Today I watched Vicky Christina Barcelona, which was good in a typical Woody Allen film kind of way. I also had a highly successful trip into town, even though it was extremely tiring. Went to the bank and tailor, picked up my packages at the post office, and bought a new phone. The new model of the flashlight phone is even nicer, and the same price. Now I just need to buy credit....

It's currently cashew apple season, and almost mango season. Cashew apples are good. Sort of difficult to describe--a little sweet, a little sour, very tannic (leaves a dry taste in your mouth). Assuming you've never tasted cashew apples, or seen what they look like (kind of funny-looking), since they're not readily available in the US of A, I took some pictures of cashew apples for your benefit.

For not having been back to Kolda in a while (3 weeks), I've spent relatively little time in my village, and feel like I've been remarkably busy. My first week back took a little adjusting to (and trying to remember the Pulaar I forgot while being gone for a month...). I taught my first business class, got caught up on what's going on at the Case (the vocational school is working well, Khady and my mom had a cat fight about who's really running the show, which I think has generally been resolved by now), and played some basketball over at the middle school. It's pretty fun, and I'm better than most of the people who play, except for one kid named Julio (where'd that come from) who's clearly played before and is taller/quicker than I am. But none of them can shoot for anything, so everything's just layups. Yet they continue to defend closely full court...but I know better. I'm hoping to get some funding for new backboards, and potentially have a basketball/life skills camp at some point. Could be fun.

The big event of the second week back in Kounkané was doing a Sex Ed "formation" (training) at the CEM (middle school) in Diaobe. Medicos del Mundo also participated, and it was overall a success (I think--we'll see when the kids actually do their health talks). We talked about reproductive health, and how to avoid teenage pregnancy (use a condom!), and both the students and teachers seemed pretty engaged (although the teachers would have their own discussions in the back of the classroom, which kind of distracted from the main presenter, but oh well), and the principal is awesome as far as supporting the program! Everybody got Tshirts and a pack of condoms at the end. Hopefully they all retain that information and can pass it on to their classmates.

The day after the Diaobe formation, I went out to spend the day in Kelly's village (we'd talked about it before, but it was also a great escape from the political rally happening in my compound that no one warned me about! There were women cooking, people drumming, and setting up speakers when I left. I might have gone crazy if I didn't have Kelly nearby). We didn't do much of anything, but we did make neem lotion--a mosquito repellant that can be made from stuff easily found in the village.

Neem lotion recipe:

Boil 2-3 handfuls of neem leaves in a little over a liter of water until the water's green and smelly.

Take off heat, mix in one large bar of Fanico soap (or other, but Fanico smells nice) that's been grated (the smaller the pieces, the better, because it'll dissolve faster).

Add about 1/10 L vegetable oil, mix until you're satisfied with the consistency.

Kounkané politics are really getting on my nerves--cars blaring music from speakers tied onto the roof have been circulating around town, disturbing my sleep/work, and there are rallies just about every day. And one of the candidates has nicknamed himself Barack Obama! That and most of the people on the board of the Case Foyer are involved politics, which means the monthly meeting got cancelled. Boo. I actually had stuff I wanted to contribute! Like it might work better if you actually had your meetings every month instead of every other month...

I did manage to talk to Sali about starting a Pulaar literacy class for the girls, which she's generally for. and she wants me to go to class too...I might go once. But my problem's not reading and writing so much as grammar and vocab... The good news is, everyone's for it. The bad news is, everyone's so wrapped up in politics they don't have time to get the details sorted out. So this might not happen till after Easter.

They're also generally in favor of having a garden at the Case, and I think I might be able to get Wula Nafaa (somehow affiliated with USAID) to fund it. I personally also want to do fruit drying, but I think I might be financing it myself this mango season since no one knows how to do it or if people will eat dry mangoes in the non-mango season. So this may turn into my experimental pet project that hopefully will get real traction next mango season. Because mango season is already upon us, although for the moment most of the mangos are still green (nmo quite ripe, but some people like them with salt--crunchy and bitter.

This past Wednesday Kelly and I went to Diaobe for the market, as usual, but this time turned out very poorly. First, Kelly got about 10,000 CFA stolen out of her pocket, but saw the guy, confronted him, and took him to the police station where he was tossed in jail. We finished up our shopping, went back there, and talked to the police chief, who said they'd call Kelly when they got her money. I definitely never want to spend any time in a Senegalese prison--it smelled like piss, and I think their questioning strategy is beat people till they confess.

So we left the police station on our bikes, and when we were in a crowd on the road, someone snatched my backpack off the back of my bike. Or at least I think that's what happened--I didn't notice till we were out of town and the bungee cord got caught in the back wheel. I didn't bother going to the police station because I didn't see the guy, so there's really no hope of getting my stuff back. I lost my phone, my Nalgene, my planner, 5,000 phone credit, and another 5,000 in cash. And the bag and the stuff I'd bought in the market. It was dumb of me to have had my bag on the back of my bike, but argh. Not going back to Diaobe anytime soon unless I have to.

When I got back to Kounkané, I told my mom (luckily she had a spare key), who said to go up to the sous-prefecture and have him call the Diaobe police station so if they find my Peace Corps ID they can give it back (really? they're going to find that?), and also called Peace Corps to let them know I lost my phone and report the theft. Shortly thereafter Etienne sent out a mass text indicating the two thefts in Diaobe. So now I'm a statistic. Awesome. When I got to Kolda today I went to the phone store and bought a SIM card, which should be the same number. But I've gotta wait till Monday to buy the phone because I don't have enough cash to buy it at the moment, so I need to go to the bank first, and that's only open on weekdays.

Friday I taught my second round of business classes. This one was on "What's a good product?" and brinstorming that abstractly was difficult. But when I introduced the new product of neem lotion, that worked a lot better. And it looks like neem lotion has potential to be quite profitable! It only costs 600 CFA + a few hours of work to make, and the girls said they'd pay about 5,000 for a batch! Huuuuge profits. Assuming that in practice they would actually pay that price. So here's my plan: make it next week during class, then get some of the girls to sell it, and see how much people will actually pay for it (hopefully a lot). BUT I won't keep the trade secrets from anyone, so if people see they can make money from it, they'll start making it until they saturate the market and profits will decrease, but then everyone will have neem lotion and they won't get malaria! Brilliant, yes? Let's just hope my ploy works, and that the neem lotion is as effective as Peace Corps makes it out to be!

Apparently the economy's going down the tubes...and the BBC did a piece on how the global recession's affecting the Senegalese economy. According to them, Senegal gets $1 billion in remittances each year, or about 5% of GDP. Significant, but not as significant as I thought it would be. Here's a link to the article (couldn't find the radio show). And another piece about how the downturn's affecting the tourism industry.

And I've also confirmed plans to go home for about 2 weeks from May 20-June 3. I'm excited. Mom even managed to get me along layover in Paris on my way over. I'm trying not to count down the weeks.

I also got photos posted from the past couple months, mostly from WAIST and the Diaobe formation. Go to Flickr.

I'm currently halfway in my expedition for ice cream. Apparently the closest ice cream around here is in the Gambia, so a bunch of volunteers are biking there today. Kelly and I biked in to Velingara this morning, will meet up with some other volunteers in Velingara and go to the Gambia this afternoon, spend the night, and come back tomorrow. It promises to be quite an adventure. Probably about 50-60 km one way.

I taught my first business classes at the Case this week. I think it was overall pretty successful, but the Thursday group was a little better than the Friday one. Also, the girls are much less educated than they're supposed to be--only a handful even made it to 6th grade, so only that handful speak any French, and another handful can't even read or write. So hopefully I won't be teaching them computers. But I still need to definitively quash that because it's just silly. But seriously, if anyone can think of something useful about teaching semi-literate people who don't speak French how to use a computer, please let me know and maybe I'll reconsider...

Another high point of the week, in terms of my personal amusement, was seeing Lamine be trampled by sheep. He went to chase what he thought was one out of the kitchen hut, but about 4 ran out. He kind of wrestled one down, and another one jumped on top of him. He was ok, and we all got a good laugh.

or "Mamadou fired from work" is a big hit in southern Senegal (apparently from Kolda to Kedougou). I'm not such a fan, mostly because people play it way too loud and on repeat, and my Pulaar's not good enough to gegt what's so hilarious about the lyrics. Not that me understanding the words would necessarily allow me to understand the humor...

And because there are horribly long interlude sketches that include painful noise, like at about the 1 min-3 min mark of this one:

This one's not tooo bad, once you get past the ridiculously long intro. Could definitely use a little help with the editing.

I'm finally back in Kolda after about a month in Thiès/Dakar. I haven't posted in a while, so here goes... (no pictures yet because I didn't take a lot, depending on other people to share them!)

The last week of IST went pretty well--I advance to Intermediate High in Pullo Fuuta, so I didn't have to stick around the training center for another week. Junior Achievement did actually end up coming to talk about what they do (probably could have done with a 1/2 day of presentation instead of a full day), and said they would give me 50 sets of materials for my business classes for free! Another highlight of IST was Dr. Savage's lecture. Dr. Savage (yes, that is his real name as far as I know) is the head PC doctor for West Africa. Most of the lecture was: if you don't take your malaria meds, you're an idiot and could die from malaria. He also touched on digestive issues, and had an idea for "The other side of Peace Corps" calendar. On the Peace Corps calendar, there's a volunteer holding hands with 2 kids. On the alternative version, he'd be squatting over a hole with diarrhea. Catchphrase: "It's a shit to mouth existence." Or, you never thought you'd spend 2 years squatting over a hole every morning wondering what's gonna come out. He also mentioned how he thinks syphilis is one of the most fascinating diseases out there, so "go ahead, make my day, get syphilis." All in jest, of course. I'm pretty sure he gives the exact same speech to every group of volunteers in West Africa, but it's agood speech, and he's one of the best presenters I've seen. A successful IST, even though just getting through the last week was a little rough.

We had to sit in traffic the last few days because everyone was pilgrimage-ing to Touba for the Maggal. It seems pretty insane, and I'd sort of like to see it, but definitely don't want to deal with an overcrowded religious event. Someone said there's an annual outbreak of cholera during the pilgrimage. Don't know how true that is. At least we managed to get a van to Dakar for WAIST that Friday, although the driver wanted to leave about 2 hours before we did so he could get to Touba. Tough luck, buddy. I'm sure he got there, just later than he wanted.

WAIST (West-African Invitational Softball Tournament) was a lot of fun. 2-3 days of craziness--expats and volunteers from Senegal, Gambia, Mauritania, Mali and Guinea all descended on Dakar (probably a good thing most of Dakar had gone to Touba for the weekend) for a (mostly) friendly softball tournament, complete with crazy costumes and American food. Definitely didn't feel like Africa. Also provided perfect sunburning opportunity for everyone: white people in the sun for entire days, while it's windy/cold so you want to be in the sun to be warm. I thankfully didn't get burned that much (hooray sunscreen!), but some other people did. Memorable plays included our Country Director pinch-hitting a homerun (although we later had to forfeit that game because he wasn't on the roster...), some good hits and catches all around, and me pitching! The most memorable pitch was a high inside one that the batter ducked, so it hit his bat, and he was out because it was a foul on the third strike (according to these slow-pitch rules). And it was nice because it was against a Senegalese team that was taking the game entirely too seriously.

I stayed with an American couple who work at the Embassy in Dakar. The lady was a Peace Corps Volunteer back in the day, and married an Ivorian man who's friend with one of my French professors at Georgetown! Their kids live in Atlanta, and one's graduating from Florida in the spring. Small world...

I think the hot season's getting underway in Kolda, which is sort of nice because it was freezing in Dakar (at least at night, and the sea breeze didn't help any), but also scary. What with the cold, being tired, probably dehydrated and not getting enough sleep for many days straight during WAIST, I now have a cold, which is no fun. And in Dakar my brain really wasn't functioning (due to previous reasons). I'm now back to totally functioning, but still tired, in English, and working back into the French and Pulaar. When I met up with my host brother Djiby in Dakar, I felt like my French was barely coherent, and Pulaar wasn't happening at all.

But it's nice to be back in Kolda where cabbies 1) don't try to rip you off (got out of the 7-place yesterday with 4 people and 4 huge bags and didn't even have to negociate for the normal 500 CFA fare) and 2) know where they're going. Can you imagine getting in a cab in New York, and having to know exactly how to get there? Granted, it helps that New York actually has addresses, but these guys don't have a clue where they're going, and don't even know what should be obvious landmarks. Incredibly frustrating, especially when they tell you they know where they're going after quoting you a price at least triple what it should be before finally bringing it down. Meh.

Mom sent me this New Yorker article (January 12 edition) about two former Peace Corps volunteers traveling in China. Most of the comments about the Peace Corps are spot on...amazing how little things change. For instance: "It was a bad job for hard-core idealists, most of whom ended up frustrated and unhappy. Pragmatists survived, and the smart ones set daily goals: learning a new Chinese phrase or teaching a poem to a class of eagerstudents. Long-term plans tended to be abandoned. Flexibility was important, and so was a sense of humor... Sometimes I thought of the Peace Corps as a reverse refugee organization, displacing all those lost Midwesterners, and it was probably the only government entity that taught Americans to abandon key national characteristics. Pride, ambition, impatience, the instinct to control, the desire toaccumulate, the missionary impulse--all of it slipped away." Definitely resonates in 2009 Peace Corps Senegal. You have to subscribe to see the article online, or email me and I'll send you the pdf.

I finally figured out what "jabeere" is. There's sort of a saying that Pullo Fuuta eat jabeere. But I've never eaten it. Apparently it's tarot root (thanks, Steve Wood), and grows all over the place in Kedougou and Guinea, Pullo Fuuta central. Still haven't eaten it, but at least I know what it looks like, thanks to a cab driver yesterday. Random, I know.

I talked to the Country Director when I was in Dakar the other day about basketball projects. Apparently there's funds out there (from the State Dept.?) for building basketball courts. Kounkané could really use some new backboards and rims, which might happen in the next few months! That'd be exciting. He also gave me a basketball, which will be a nice gift for my family when I go back.

Probably not how you spell it, but who cares how you spell stuff here anyways? It's basically what you gave to Goodwill a few years ago, for sale in Senegal. Some gems from today were a Bengals jersey, a pile that clearly came from Hawaii (all the shirts had Hawaii something or another on them), and a number of hockey sweaters. I'm still waiting on that article of Georgetown apparel, and I'll buy it!

I finally got a chance to look at the feedback from my language test, and the last comment was, "Lots of Fulakunda." Seriously? You're going to scold me for mixing in a different Pulaar, the one that's the majority in my village?? I mean, I'd understand getting "too much French," but I didn't even get that! Whatever... it's been good to get my Pulaar grammar corrected so now I speak more proper Pulaar, in addition to being able to get my point across.

Other than that, not too much to report from the training center.

Our plan to watch the SuperBowl was foiled. We got to the hotel, turned the TV to the channel it was supposed to be on, and found a documentary on horses. Not quite what we were looking for. We stuck around for a little while, hoping it would end, but it didn't. We watched GameCast and listened to the audio (streaming was too slow for video) through the first quarter, but it wasn't worth it. We even called Darren's mom to ask if she could point the webcam at the TV so we could watch via Skype. But no luck. Not that I cared a lot anyways.

We’ve continued commuting between Pout and Thiès, and it’s still a minor pain. We actually seem to be leaving earlier this week, even though we’re picking up more people. The family’s still good, but I’m a little tired of watching France24 on loop for 2 hours (it’s like Headline News in French, so after the first half hour, you’ve basically got everything), so I’ve been going to bed a bit earlier. That and I’ve been tired. Monday night I watched Milk on my laptop. Good, but I liked Slumdog Millionaire better. Hopefully I’ll watch Burn After Reading sometime later this week. I hear it’s goodsome good shots of Georgetown.

Monday morning we took our language tests. I didn’t advance in Pulaar, which was a surprise relative to how I feel I was doing in the village, but not relative to how I felt during the test. I’m pretty sure I answered some questions wrong, but which I means I answered the wrong question, and couldn’t adequately describe some things. But some of it’s not language—I’d have trouble answering them on the spot in English too. Like “What’s difficult about your village?” Well, I don’t know…it’s not that hard…nothing’s really jumping out at me. After saying something about pulling water and pounding stuff, which wasn’t what she was looking for, I said the schools were always on strike so the children don’t learn. Meh. So Thomas and I got called into the principal’s office to meet with Simone, Demba and Chris and were told that since we didn’t advance out of Intermediate Mid, we’d be staying in Pullo Fuuta with Cellou. Meh. But they said we’d get a few hours of Wolof next week if we were doing better with the Pulaar. Annoying, but probably better for me to clean up my Pulaar. And I’ll still get survival Wolof.

Monday morning after the language test I went to the bank, which is a process because I have neither an ATM card nor a checkbook, so I need to get them to write a cashier’s check. So the guy at the desk asked for my phone number as a means of contact if the check bounced or something (not uncommon here or in America). I waited about an hour to get to the other window where I was handed my cash, and by the time I got back to the Center, I had a text that said: slt tw mw c jules l stagiare d la bank alor di mw kesk u fé com étud o sénegal xcuz du 2rangemt alor cété just pr une simpl connéssance pour partage d cultur. Which took a little deciphering, but basically the guy at the bank texted me to ask what I’m studying in Senegal, sorry to bother, just for cultural exchange. Only in Senegal would the guy at the bank use your contact info to contact you for personal reasons! And from work at that! Needless to say, I didn’t respond. Also only in Senegal would a contract for a new roof include tea and sugar expenses. Sarah’s did, and it was negotiated with a Peace Corps representative there! Seriously? You include tea ingredients in a roofing contract??

The other night I had an interesting conversation with my host dad about he almost emigrated to Europe with a woman his brother knew in the Netherlands. He could have even gotten papers saying he was unmarried with no kids, even though this was two years ago and he’s got a family, because they’re only married in the church, but not on paper. But he decided not to do it because the circumstances were so fuzzy and he didn’t know what he was getting into. Tough decision. And he used to have a farm on the edge of town that he worked but technically belonged to his brother (literal or figurative, I’m not sure) but his brother took back the land in a lawsuit and my host dad lost everything. Sounds like he’s had a rough life, which you can kind of tell by talking to him. But I don’t like asking personal questions like that. Just glad he didn’t actually emigrate.

I was also trying to explain how people get in debt using credit cards in the US, and just chose an income of $10,000 a month because it’s not too big, and easy to work with. He didn’t get how someone could possible spend more than $10,000 a month. Very easily…I said for a family, but there’s no way you could support a family on that amount. That’s about half the poverty line. I don’t think I could support myself on that amount. But then again, I have no idea how I’d go through 5 million FCFA in a month. That’s almost 10 times what I make in 3 months.

I hesitate to say I’m looking forward to the hot season, because really the concept scares me, but I’ve been really cold the past couple days. It hasn’t warmed up till about noon, and yesterday we had class in one of the small huts in the compound, which might as well be outside, and I was freezing. Even my nose was cold. I even resorted to standing in the sun at break because it was warmer. What’s become of me?! It can’t have been any cooler than between 50 and 60, but it felt really really cold. Sad.

I got back to Thies a week ago for IST, 3 weeks of SED-related training. It's been kind of strange going back to having my life scheduled for me, and not really having any free time, but not as bad as I thought it was going to be. I've been commuting every day between Pout and Thies. It would definitely be nicer to be staying in Thies, because then I would have time to go in town and do shopping/errands, and go running and stuff, but the weekend's been pretty good for that so far. And it has been great to see people. The Kedougou crew got in today, so it's been good to see them too. The rest of the Aggies are due to arrive tomorrow, and then the gang's all here.

It's been weird going back to being Mariama Diallo (even my Pout family thinks Hawlatou's a weird name!). Not much has changed, but people seem to be hanging out less due to the cold and school being in session, so it's too cold to sit outside and talk, and the kids are doing homework. And they also got satellite TV, so now all they do is sit around and watch TV5 or France24. Not too exciting. And doesn't really do anything for my Pulaar. But maybe once I start Wolof next week (inshallah), I can practice on them. They noticed that my hair's longer, and asked what I did to make it grow (nothing...). Sort of boggled their mind. And then trying to explain how Peace Corps works...just kind of confusing when explaining to a 10 year old. But everyone was excited to see me, and I can now talk to my mom and grandmother, so that's cool. Just can't really talk to the kids at all...whatever. Maybe when I start Wolof.

Today we had a field trip to Keur Moussa, a monastery that makes goat cheese and grows fruit. Probably the closest you can get the locally produced French food here. I'm really excited about my dinner of goat cheese, tapalappa, and bissap wine. Yuuum.

Other than that it's been a not so exciting week. Lots of sitting in class (the most fun has been NOT sitting in class--either the field trip today, doing pepinières yesterday, and interviewing a local refrigerator salesman), commuting, and watching TV. And I think it might be just a tad colder up here than in Kolda, but I'm not sure. My blanket may just be a little less warm than my sleeping bag. Tomorrow night we're going to the hotel where we watched the election to watch the Super Bowl. Should be a good time, and I'll have Wifi/Skype capabilities starting around 10 here, so 5 pm Eastern.

I made the trip up to Thies today with Mike, and it all went pretty smoothly. 10 1/2 hours from the Kolda garage to the center. Not bad. And we lucked out that the Gambians didn't hassle us at all at the border--didn't even ask for our passports. They must have gotten paid recently. And we got the last 2 spots in a 7 place so only spent 10 minutes in the Mbour garage switching to a car to Thies. We were really tired when we got in, and the first ones to get here (and the longest trip), so I showered and napped before people started getting in and headed in town to Pamanda's, which now has wifi! It's kind of weird being back in Thies, and the fact that we'll have 4 classes tomorrow is very strange. But it is nice to see everyone. It'll be really nice when all the aggies get here next week.

Last night before leaving we watched Slumdog Millionnaire, which was great. Five stars. I highly recommend it.

I just spent 17 days in Kounkané, which is my new record for how long I've not come in to Kolda. It went by pretty fast--I feel like I was pretty busy--and included a trip to Velingara and another one to Diaobe, both for meetings for a Medicos del Mundo-funded and Laura-led Sex Ed project to try to cut down on teen pregnancy (a big reason why a lot of girls drop out of school here). The meetings were successful--we've set up dates for training at the Diaobe CEM (middle school of sorts, classes 6e-3e, ages 12-20+). The idea is to train 50 students and 15 teachers so they can lead "sensibilisations" once a month for their peers. We'll just be there to support/facilitate. Laura did this in her CEM Sare Coly Salle last year, and pregnancies dropped from 15 to 5. So this year Medicos is expanding to CEM Diaobe and Kounkané. The Kounkané meeting was slightly less successful--the principal (who's new) seemed minimally engaged, and we didn't fix dates, but the teachers seemed pretty excited so inshallah it'll work out.

I biked the 27 km up to Velingara for the meeting with Medicos, went to the meeting, had lunch, did some internet, and by the time I was done, it was too late to bike back so I got in the last bus going my direction. I was definitely 1 person too many (didn't think that was possible in these already overcrowded vehicles) as I didn't have a seat and so stood in the back holding on to the roof until the first person got off. Definitely one of the scarier experiences so far in Senegal, and I definitely would have failed the dumbass test if anything had happened. But I made it back safe and sound, so that's what counts right?

The other big events of this last stint in the village were the visits by Peace Corps admin. Dr. Ararat made a visit to check in and make sure I'm healthy and my living conditions are A-OK. She said I have the best hut in Senegal that she's seen! The screen doors and tarped roof got rave reviews, and even warranted taking pictures! Mark and Bamba also stopped in to see how everything's going work-wise before IST (In-Service Training) starts on Monday. Nothing too exciting. Bamba bought some of the uber-cheap peanut butter for himself and Demba. They were also puzzled by the ways of these peanut-butter sellers.

The WorldVision vocational school got underway this week, and seems to be off to a good start. I still think it's too bad I'll miss the first month or so being up in Thiès for IST. But it may be a good opportunity for them to realize it's better for me to teach business than IT. I think their French is minimal, so I'll have to either get one of them to translate, or teach in Pulaar, which will necessitate a tutor becauase my Pulaar's definitely not there yet, although I can generally get my point across in conversation. Even Khady's noticed their reading/writing isn't where she thought it was going to be. But Senegalese realize that computers are the future, so are really excited about learning to use them. They just don't realize this is the wrong target audience. So I think I'll try to set up separate computer classes for other people at the Case Foyer. Even my illiterate non-Francophone mom wants me to teach her how to use a computer before I leave. A quoi ça sert...?

That's about it for work-related matters. In other news, the Muslim New Year (Tamkharit) arrived, but without the cross-dressing component it was billed with. I may have just gone to sleep before that happened, since I saw previous years' pictures of my sisters in men's boubous and cotton-ball beards. Really not too bummed about missing that... It also involved a Happy New Year/blessing ceremony where all the important old men convened at the Case to greet everyone and wish them a happy and prosperous New Year. Literally 20 speeches that were all basically the same, and got translated between Pulaar and Wolof (for the fonctionnaires). My mom caught me dozing off, but didn't seem too upset about it.

The other big excitement was the fire next door. A hut caught on fire in the compound next to mine (my hut was actually the closest to it) when some boys were playing and a spark got the roof. Still not exactly sure what they were doing--a car battery was involved in the story, so it can't be that safe to begin with, especially since we're talking about 7 year olds. I was sitting in my hut with Mike and Kelly and heard/saw people running, then looked to the left and saw the hut in flames. Definitely a low-tech firefighting operation of pulling water as fast as possible and running the buckets over there. Also not particularly effective, since I think everything in the hut was lost. And it was a lot--someone said 3 million FCFA--30 sacks of rice, 2 computers, some farming equipment, and cash. It was 2 guys getting ready to go up to university in Dakar. And it's all gone. Because there's no insurance on any of that, so it literally just went up in flames. One of the other huts in my compound was in the line of fire/wind, so caught just a little bit, but was put out before anything got damaged. One of my uncles got on my roof and doused it with water, but if the wind had been blowing in my direction it would've been toast. Now every time I look at the thatched roofs I can only think about how perfect they are for catching on fire--dry straw in a pyramid shape. Just about what you would do if you wanted to start a fire. On the other hand, fatalities in hut fires must be pretty low since you can get out of a one-room buiding pretty quickly. The fire even invaded my mefloquine dreams--I dreamt I had lit a candle on my bookshelf, which then caught all my Peace Corps paperwork (and it's a lot) on fire, which got my roof. And I was trying to decide whether to get out the front door (locked, near flames, could save the valuable stuff in my trunk) or back (unlocked, closer to me, can't save anything, would just be in the tiny backyard). That was an unpleasant one.

I've had a lot of lunch/dinner guests recently, and my food continues to get rave reviews, from the Tcheb to the lacciri jumbo. Evelina came over for lunch one day and was raving about having meat, which she doesn't get a lot of in the village. My family appreciated the compliment, but also thought it was funny, so sort of mocked, "oh the village, they only eat peanut sauce all the time. poor souls." Laura and Maggie also liked my lacciri jumbo so much they were scared to go back to their villages and not like it anymore.

I've made friends with Aminata, my niece of sorts. I started playing the little girls' clapping game "Miss Mary Mack..." with her, and she was OK at clapping, but started singing a different song. Whatever. Actually got her engaged in something. This was after she was copying me--if I crossed my legs, she did; if I leaned forward, she did, etc. Turns out kids are the same everywhere! Then the other day I was trying to teach her addition, but it wasn't sinking in at all. She's in kindergarten and is just starting 1+1, nothing above 10, but doesn't get it. And thought 11 came after 8. Frustrating, but maybe we'll be able to do 3+2 eventually.

It appears to be papaya season, which is yummy. We had some of that in the village, and at the house since there's a papaya tree here.

My mom has created a Pulaar verb out of d'accord (OK). I suppose it would be dakorugol. Essentially "to agree on something." But there's not even a French verb for that, other than "se mettre d'accord." Sheesh.

The bane of Senegalese TV for me is watching the news. It's always just a summary of what President Wade did that day. The best of the past week were seeing him at some UN event for African-American culture, during which he made some really boring speech while seated next to Jesse Jackson, which made my day. Akon was also there. Then a few nights ago the first 20+ minutes of the news was just Abdoulaye Wade talking. He got back from a long trip really early in the morning and was having a press conference, talking ridiculously slowly because it was 4 am and he's 80-some odd. Then they switched back to the studio to say something about Obama's inauguration, then switched BACK to the press conference to hear Wade's commentary on it. What the hell?! I wanted to see REAL coverage of Obama's first day in office! Poor journalism, RTS.

My family loves 24 (aka Jack Bauer). We've been watching Season 6 (I think), and they think Americans are sooo smart for having tiny microphones, and GPS chips, etc. And also make fun of the Chinese speaking "Ching-ching chong." Apparently Jack Bauer's fighting malaria, so if I can figure out a way to get it on DVD, I'm sure it would be an instant hit in Kounkané. If only it could be translated into French.

And I'll leave you with the brilliance of Coca Cola's marketing department. A similar ad (but I couldn't find it) is playing in the prime TV ad spot (half time of the telenovela Coeur du péché), every night, and they LOVE it. Brilliant because they've managed to target the African consumer AND not even use any words, so they can play the same ad across the continent and it'll work. Plus they're in primetime. American viewers probably won't be so engaged, but then again I don't think the penguins/polar bears/Willy Wonka behind the vending machine would work here, especially because there aren't any vending machines. Anyways, Kudos to Coke for their marketing genius.