New Year's was a LOT of fun. I was sitting in my hut reading when two other volunteers randomly showed up outside of my hut, thus concluding an 18 day bike trip. It was a nice surprise : ) We went to Mbour and stocked up on snacks, came back to my village, and tried to stay up until midnight. I was the only one who made it, and just barely. Also, I found out today that my watch has been at least 45 minutes slow for the past week, but it has made absolutely no difference to my life in the village.

The excitement is over now, though, and I am back to the battle in which I have been engaged for the past week. Call it the Great Fence Standoff. The fence next to my shower area (cement slab with a hole in the middle) is completely destroyed, and my family offered to get me new fence and put it up. But they wanted me to pay for it (only like...two dollars) but the rest of my fence is totally fine. That part broke because my younger mom sneaks branches out of it at like 6am to use for firewood, and the horses and donkeys both eat and scratch their entire bodies on it. So, I refused to pay on principle. I bought a whole new fence last year. This is just how things go in Senegal. I cant tell them to buy me a new one, so its been a week of passive aggressive endeavors on the part of me and my family. They steal part of my fence, I steal some of theirs, they dry leaves for food in my backyard, I dont tell them that their goats are eating the leaves after getting in through my broken fence, etc.

You may be thinking I need to get a life. I agree. But, for now, Im content to sit around reading Game of Thrones and showing my family that I have been here long enough to outmanouvre them in a typical Senegalese Standoff. I will let you know who wins.

Oh, and on January First, first action of the New Year, was to have the fence fall on my head while I was squatting over the cement slab. Of course.

Hapy New Year!

Its my favorite holiday! This marks my third Christmas ever away from home, and while I am pretty much ready to get back to the states in a few months, its been a nice vacation here! Even now, at the Peace Corps office in Dakar, Im looking out the window at palm trees waving around in the sunshine, with the Atlantic spanning endless blue in the background...and I can hear Christmas carols wafting up from the Christian center next door. Last night, a few other volunteers came to the office where Im staying (nice air conditioned rooms and TV) and I cooked up a bunch of french onion soup with plenty of Gruyere cheese on top. I also made scones, and we drank champagne while watching the extended Lord of the Rings movies : )

After the second movie, we got dressed up and set off in a cab to downtown Dakar, where there is a massive cathedral. Fireworks were being set off all night throughout the entire city, which tends to happen on every holiday. There was a mass at 10pm in French, which was an interesting and moving experience. The Senegalese drums were, of course, broken out at one point during a carol. After two and a half hours of mass, we decided to head out early. We were some of the last non-senegalese people left. I have no idea how long the mass went on for, but all ceremonies here tend to go on FOREVER.

Anyways, today we're watching Christmas movies, eating a Bouche de Noel, and having peppermint hot chocolate. I have a box of gifts from home, including Cheez-its, which are almost gone already : D Plus the Game of Thrones books which is all I plan on doing for the next week or so.

Im really excited for the new year. I will have officially completed one full year living in Africa, and will go into 2012 knowing I get to come home as an RPCV! This has been an amazing year, and an amazing experience overall (and will continue to be probably). I have no idea where the next year will take me. Im hoping grad school, but who knows? Fingers crossed. Since I probably wont be posting again before New Years, Ill put up my resolutions here. Merry Christmas everyone! I'll be calling America soon. Happy New Year as well, and if you are reading this, I hope to see you in 2012!!

Resolutions:

1. Get home in one piece.

2. Get my cat home in one piece.

3. Get into grad school or find an exciting job.

4. Set up two new sites here in Senegal.

5. Bake a LOT of good food once Im back in America.

Should be do-able : ) Back to the Christmas movies!

In Senegal, this hot and dry land of infinite frustration, PC volunteers are sometimes driven to rely on the small things for emotional relief. For example, I brought my cat into Mbour today to be fixed, and couldnt get them to start the surgery until I had been hit on relentlessly by the 4 male employees. Infinite Frustration. At times like that..I miss America. But, luckily, a lot of other things make up for it.

My younger mom had a baby last week, and they named it Buree. I didnt even know that was a name. In French, Buree is one way of saying Drunk. They call it Baby Buree. Drunk Baby. I came into the city and when I left, my family asked for a gift of baby clothes (they always ask for something or other, with about a 25 percent success rate) and I hadnt really planed on getting anything. Until I saw a baby shirt emblazoned with the phrase "Powered By Cheese." I would have bought that at any cost. So, watching the baby buree being carted around in a powered by cheese t shirt should provide some comic relief over the next few months : )

When I told my Senegalese family I was taking my cat in to get an operation, my older mom completely lost it. I havent heard her laugh that loudly and uncontrollably since the great "toubab tries to do laundry by hand" incident of 2010. People in Senegal dont get operations unless theyre deathly ill. So...the fact that I was getting an unessecary operation for my CAT was totally incomprehensible.

Oh well. Time to go get the cat and hope he survived, and hope I dont have to get hit on AGAIN. Also, my dad filled out a customs form for a care package valuing the contents at 25 dollars. So when the post office charged me an extra 2500 cfa for the package, which is ridiculous, I asked why, and they pointed at the customs form. Logic there? Zero. I still had to pay for it. This country, sometimes...

My cat in village ran away last week. He is now, apparently, back. Im in Dakar, but have been calling my host family every day to ask. All of the cats in Senegal kind of look like they came from the same litter, so I have my fingers crossed that my family isn't feeding a random different cat every day by accident.

After everything that has happened here, the cat, my flip-flops, and my ipod are the only things I still own. I like the cat the most, and Im so glad he's back : )

I probably shouldnt be posting right now because I havent slept in like four days and am feeling pretty anti Senegal right now, but luckily I handwrote a post about a week ago when I was in a better mood, so Ill try and type that up, hoping the electricity doesnt cut out! For the record, I havent slept because these past four days have been Tabaski, Senegals biggest holiday, where tons of people Ive never met come to the village, and the amount of laughing at the white person speaking sereer, and being hit on by strangers, that ensues is bothersome. It is nice to see people that work elsewhere and come back to the village though, like my sisters who are pretty cool. The reason Ive been so stressed out, though, is that this year they rented out a generator to BLAST terrible music from a spot about twenty feet from my room, thus the not sleeping, and we eat nothing but sheep, oil, and pasta for four days. I didnt plan ahead and stock up on snacks, which was obviously a huge oversight on my part. Trust me. You dont want to know what day four of leftover sheep parts in a country where refrigerators dont exist might include. My cat wouldnt even touch it. I took a video on my ipod of what can only be referred to as a meat clothesline. You can probably imagine it, but if youve ever seen viscera hanging next to laundry out to dry and realized how similar they look...you would understand why I have sworn never to eat sheep again. Not knowingly at least. I have been surviving on white bread and lollipops. Oh, and my phone was dead the whole time so I didnt have my usual channel of sanity to tap into. Everything is back to normal now, though, so I am looking forward to a nice, long, nap followed by like twelve hours of sleep. Then tomorrow I will try and get back to work on grad school apps. OK, heres the happier blog post! Fair warning, I cant find the apostrophe, quotation marks, or parentheses, on this keyboard.

And, with my hands poised to write, real life just hit me in the face. I just found out that my Papaw had a stroke this morning, Ill try to find a way to call home, apparently he is resting comfortably. I dont know details, so I wont write anymore. Ill still go on with this other post, though, more as a distraction than anything else. Then Im biking home and going straight to sleep before I can hope to deal with anything.

K, here goes: On my evening walk today, I was listening to the latest This American Life which was about middle school. One 7th grader who had just moved to a new town was explaining how hard it was because in middle school, people care too much about who is cool and who isnt, and its difficult to make friends in that environment. He mentioned that in kindergarten, however, you can basically just walk up to anyone and say hi, want to be my friend?

I remember being in that same situation when we moved from California to Michigan when I was going into 6th grade, and I think my family was worried, or, well, concerned, about how I would do with it. However, I loved 6th grade. I vividly remember standing in Mrs. Levys math classroom straight through lunch while she graded papers, just to watch the snow falling through the window. In Santa Cruz, we used to drive out to Tahoe to ski every year, but Id never lived somewhere where snow could be a daily occurance. Everyone else trooped off through the hallways to the cafeteria and I was rooted to the spot, thinking it was like magic, standing in a snow globe. Beanie babies were cool then, I used to have friends over to trade, discuss our collections, and gossip about how attractive Leo DiCaprio was in Titanic, which came out that year. I also used to disappear for entire afternoons with my Nature Notebook, sitting in the wetland behind our condo watching Canada Geese arrive, build nests, and raise little goslings. Id never seen a Canada Goose before. I also used to watch and draw frogs laying eggs, tadpoles sprouting arms and legs, crawling out of the water and hopping around, and then disappearing when ice started forming on the pond.

Then, however, seventh grade arrived. They shuffled us around, and I didnt really know anyone in my group of classes anymore. Luckily, yearbook and art class came along, and I learned to use Photoshop and my Moms ancient Pentax SLR camera which I still have. I wanted to be Cool, though, so unfortunately, instead of hanging out with the people I really ended up liking, the ones who got into computer games and programming, the unabashedly smart kids, basically, I decided I needed cooler friends, and wore the same rotation of tommy hilfiger and bebe shirts pretty much every week. I wasnt cool, but was happily in denial anyways. I also decided, at some point in there, that it was necessary for me to become a cheerleader. Anyways, crushes on real life, non movie star, boys began, and awkward dances started occuring every month. The first time I danced with a boy, I didnt know how, and remember in excruciating detail as I, in my Gap shirt with a rhinestone cat on the front, put my arms around his waist. His arms were also around mine, and as we awkwardly moved in small circles, I would periodically come around to see my friends furiously gesturing for me to move my arms up to his neck, which I mistakenly took as encouragement, and Im pretty sure I even gave them a thumbs up at one point. I dont think I ever talked to him again after that...haha.

Then came 8th grade. In CA, at the small private catholic school I had attended, the 8th graders were Kings and Queens. They had been there since pre school and reigned over the student body kingdom for a year before entering a mysterious thing called High School. In Novi, MI, though...it was terrible. Gossiping, judgement, what clothes everyone wore, ie. hormones, all hit their boiling point. At that point, I really should have just gone with it and just hung out with the uncool people I actually liked, but hung on stubbornly to some nebulous idea of how to be popular. I got bangs, terrible idea, got a highlighter yellow puffy ski jacket, and wore fluorescent white eyeshadow every day, which looks GREAT on redheads.... : P

Luckily, my family sent me off to the Pacific Northwest for Outdoor Adventure camp that summer, where I learned that there was a lot more to life than worrying about which lunch table to sit at, and that I love hiking camping etc. I still wanted to be a cheerleader, though, since my fixations run pretty deep. I mean, Ive wanted to be a PCV since that summer and here I am. I got on the team, entered high school, continued running track, hurdles at that point, and realiwed that nobody really cared about what everyone else was doing anymore. I quickly fell into place, eventually quit the cheer team, started the outdoor adventure club, worked backstage on plays, was in french club, worked for the newspaper, and ran track all four years. I got a 4.0, got into University of Michigan, and have basically had fun nerding out ever since.

What I want to express, though, is that one of the best things about Senegalese culture, as well as volunteer culture, is that its just like kindergarten. You can walk up to anyone and they are automatically your friend. Senegalese people love talking and just hanging out, and volunteers understand each other and support each other in a way that is unparalleled in the US. Not to undermine friendships at home, I just wanted to say that the ability to be open and supportive towards anyone is something we could all use a little more of in our lives, and something I think Ive learned to do well here. This is where I would insert a smiley face but I have no idea where it is on this computer. Oh well, thanks as always for reading!

Longest post ever, whew. Love you all, wish me luck with the grad school apps and say a prayer for my Papaw! Oh, and ignore spelling errors. Im not editing this, Im going home and going to bed. At one in the afternoon, hehe.

Hi everyone, you havent heard from me in a long time. Not for any particular reason, except that things just seem pretty normal here, and you probably don't want to hear about what Ive been having for lunch every day (oily rice and fish, in case you are actually curious). On a daily basis my emotions can be found somewhere along the spectrum of overwhelming love for this country, apathetic contentment, and an almost manic desire to run to the airport and hop on the first plane home. I wont lie, Im excited to have about 5 months left, but am not looking forward to that end date too anxiously. Currently, Im trying to figure out what to do with my life when I get back to the US, besides the obvious: kiss the ground the second I get off the plane (dont worry, I've spent the past two years building up an immunity against all germs), eating everything in sight, drinking a lot of good draft beer and coffee, fishing for real fish in real rivers, and wearing sweaters. Big, soft, comfy, sweaters.

Anyways, what prompted me to finally update this here blog is the fact that Im actually supposed to be writing a statement of purpose for grad school. I have a vague idea of what I will write, and am slowly working on an outline. However, I wish there were some way I could express to the admissions committees who will eventually see me as one more black and white piece of paper in the pile, just how animated of a situation is necessary for me to wrangle that sheet of paper into existence in the first place.

I am currently sitting in a regional house, one day before halloween. All of the appliances somehow managed to break around the same time, so three of us are all squashed together at the one desk in the house where we are trying to get stuff done with the few machines we do have. I am attempting to type up a professional and convincing essay for potential grad schools, while the monitor flicks on and off due to the volunteer to my left who is messing with electrical wires in an attempt to get the phone to work, while he shouts out the window in Wolof (a local language). The volunteer to my right is working on her halloween costume, and trying to coax a very stubborn printer into printing out a picture of a handgun. The gun has thus far deigned only to come out as either the size of a paperclip, or too large to fit on the paper. Another volunteer behind us is trying to get a fan to work so we wont all die of heat stroke, but the already heavily duct-taped blades and electrical cord are making that difficult. I am drinking coffee that someone made using salty sink water instead of filtered freshwater (which is delivered weekly to the house by a man on a donkey drawn cart) so my coffee tastes like a vaguely hazelnut flavored ocean. Another volunteer just entered the picture looking for a permanent marker, which means a lot of drawer wrenching and slamming, thus rocking the computer monitor back and forth.

There is also a random full sheet of paper lying next to the computer that says, in angry red letters, "PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE!" I have no idea why. The halloween preparations mean that a few lady gagas are wandering around the house, there is wig sewing, shoe coloring, and glow-painting going on. Last night I turned a corner to face a fully masked Storm Trooper. I do have a mario costume put together, but have decided not to travel the 5 hours to get to the halloween party in the interest of having some peace and quiet. As much as that can be achieved in Senegal, at least.

I know I will be an excellent grad school student, and that I am ready to work hard for the right program. I have extensive experience, speak a few languages, love aquatic science and fish almost to the point of obsession, and would be happy to move anywhere to attend a good program (as long as its not in africa, though, sorry). Compared to the people in america, though, or in research stations around the world, with air conditioning, fast internet, career advising services, and coffee shops where one can leisurely write a stellar essay while drinking espresso and eating a chocolate muffin...how can I possibly put together a successful application???

But I will. Somehow. So, I'll stop blog posting now and get back to the somewhat functional madness. Wish me luck : /

I am basically writing to put some space between my life now, and the last two blog posts : ) I also wanted to generally say a few things that don't count as updates or stories, and there probably wont be any pictures from now on (no camera).

First of all, I have been spending a lot of time thinking about what I want to accomplish during the rest of my time here, which seems shorter and shorter every day (because it is, technically, ha...). Seven months can fly by! While things can be hard here, Im generally very happy not having any major life worries, have enough money to support myself, have the most flexible schedule imaginable, awesome friends, and am working towards a goal Ive had since middle school. Im starting to get excited about the thought of going home and getting a real job, but am also not quite ready to start making big life decisions again and thinking about what I should be doing.

I have also been thinking a lot about my friends and family at home! When I am online, I am usually borrowing someone else's computer for an hour here and there, and wish I could spend more time catching up, reading blogs, writing emails, and generally spending more time "with" people the only way I can over here. Everyone's lives are moving forward, and I have been hearing all about the issues that come with finding jobs, deciding where to live, figuring out whats important at this point in our lives, and everything that comes with being a recent college graduate : ) I've always kind of wondered when I would hit this point, where I just want to get back to the US, get a job, find a spot, and stay put for a good long time. With nice clothes, a garden, a dog, etc. My plan now is to go back to Victoria, hopefully, and go to grad. school, but if I could arrange it, Id be pretty happy to just hunker down in NC or MD with an interesting Forest Service or Parks Service job. Who knows. Basically, I MISS YOU ALL, friends and family, and want to see everyone when I get home! I have no idea how possible that is, esp without a car, but at least I'll be able to buy electronics and actually be in touch with people : )

So, my life here is officially back on track. My hut is all fixed up again, and I have a whole new wardrobe thanks to old volunteers' castoffs, which are actually pretty nice. Im having a couple of people visit this week, and am spending next week in Dakar working at English Camp, which was one of my favorite things from last year! Then, I am having a birthday sleepover in my village with some other volunteers, working at an environmental education camp on the beach for a week, meeting up with my whole stage (group) for a summit, and then pairing up with my sitemate for some *awesome* halloween costume-ing. Photos to come, I hope. Then, Ill be applying to schools, maybe eventually jobs, and who knows. But, for now, Im sending out lots of love to everyone who reads this, and also wish I could be hanging out with everyone on your amazing travels and adventures! Senegal doesn't feel like travel or an adventure anymore, the novelty has more or less worn off.

So, as they say in Senegal, "It is here, we are here, in Peace." That pretty much sums it up!

I finally got back to my village, ready for a solid week of just hanging out, spending time with my family, and reading until the end of Ramadan, when I will get back to work. Sadly, it was not meant to be.

Apparently, while I was gone, there was a massive rainstorm, and my entire room flooded. My mom and brothers went in there and piled everything on top of my bed, and my mom moved some of the stuff to her room in big rice sacks. If youve ever experienced constant muggy/rainy weather, then you know how quickly things mold. A lot of my books, bags, and clothing literally disintegrated. There was also a large moldy dead thing in the corner that I made my brother remove for me. As I found out last rainy season, Im allergic to the mold, so the rash spreading up both of my arms has pretty much taken over my entire body in the last 24 hours. Luckily, my family is amazing, and they told me to just sit, relax, and deal with it tomorrow. So, since they had taken off my mattress and sheets, and everything I own was piled on my bed, I just slept in my moms room. I would have started cleaning out my hut today, but I had to come into Mbour to get a new phone, which was much easier than I expected! I was also able to find some medicine for the rash, so hopefully that will be taken care of soon.

I do have good news, though! In a random burst of intelligence, I hung up my bag of electronics, checkbook, letters from friends and family, and passport right before leaving my village, so none of it was affected! Also, Pippin is fine, which is way more important to me than all the stuff that got ruined.

Anyways, I thought Id write a quick note on one of the many strange things they do here in Senegal. This morning I had to withdraw money from the bank (where I have been going for the last year and a half, btw)and the woman behind the counter was adamant that the signature in their computer did not match the one I had signed on my check, and thus refused to give me money. The same signature was also on my passport, bank ID card, and the back of the check...ridiculous. So, after I made it crystal clear that I would not be leaving without my money, and was glad to wait all day holding up the line, she gave me a post it note and made me sign it over and over again while I looked at the one in their computer system until it was exactly the same.

When I studied abroad in Switzerland, a similar thing happened. I walked into the post office, and went up to a counter to pay for a package. The teller looked at me like I was crazy, and just pointed to a machine that dispenses numbers for waiting in line, about 50 yards away. She and I were literally the only people in the building. I walked over, got my number, she hit the button to officially call me over, and I went right back to the same counter where she was perfectly friendly and happy to help me.

Yeesh.

I almost forgot...while visiting my friend Cara's site where I don't speak the language, her family was talking at me and gesturing to a mattress with blankets on it that was laid out on the ground (mattress out on the sand=normal here). Naturally, I assumed they were telling me to go sit down. I walked over and was about to sit down when I was frantically intercepted by a tiny old woman who was shouting in Puular and shaking her finger at the mattress. When Cara returned, the situation was immediately clarified. The pile of blankets? Turns out it was a newborn baby. I almost sat on a baby.

During training, they advise us not to write blog posts when we are not in a good mood, or are in the middle of a frustrating situation. I have been waiting for that moment when the clouds roll back to reveal a shining happy Senegal for a while now, so that I might write an optimistic and charmingly clever blog post, but no such luck. So! Im just going to dump all of my problems onto this here blog because that's obviously the most logical and responsible thing to do.

First off, my journal was stolen, so I will be cataloging events on here in hopes of remembering them in the future. To begin, I went to the regional house for a live radio show that another volunteer and I do monthly. For some reason we now have to do it at 8pm, which meant walking around a residential area of Kaolack at night in a rainstorm hoping to find a cab. And when you think rainstorm...don't you dare imagine a lovely dark sky, the smell of spring, and the sound of rain falling on a tin roof,all being enjoyed from a porch with a mountain view where you are wrapped up in a soft blanket sipping hot chocolate with a dog by your side and perhaps an attractive man who is baking you a pie at the moment, but will come sit with you in a minute when it's done. No. Think, river of trash and mud that has just reunited with its best friend, the city-wide flooding sewer. Add in the fact that there's no electricity, so I could have literally been stepping in anything. I may not have actually seen any rats using trash as lifeboats, but I wouldn't have been surprised.

The next morning, I got a ride to Tamba, our neighboring region, because I have little work to do at my site during Ramadan, and am interested in seeing a project that other volunteers have been doing on Malaria prevention. Along the trip I managed to blow out a bike tire, for which I had no replacement, and had to beg another volunteer for her bike for the rest of the trip. Later, I was biking with another volunteer when we got separated, and some guys approached me and stole my backpack. Camera, phone, external hard drive, clothing, chess set (ok, I guess that makes sense, they probably get bored watching cows all day), and my journal which obviously they are now going to read, and post all of my deepest darkest secrets on facebook.

It was not an enjoyable experience to say the least, but, things happen, and at least Im fine! Luckily I had my glasses on my face, and my ipod in my pocket. Those are the two things I care about the most. And my shoes...which were on my feet. To be clear, this was a freak occurrence. I've never felt unsafe in this country, and everyone has been super helpful about getting me to the right authorities, lending me money, etc. The best part is that we have boxes of clothes in the regional houses where people put stuff they don't want anymore, and we can buy them back to raise money for SeneGAD (gender and development). By some freak chance, ALL of the clothes in all of the senegad boxes fit me. I now have cuter and way more clothes than I did before the incident.

Anyways, in the middle of this whole ordeal, the cutest puppy in the world wandered into the regional house and started following me around. I fed him and gave him a name and a collar. When I left to take him back to my village, though, we put him in the back of a peace corps car in a big basket that was tied and duct taped shut. We got to another volunteer's site to drop her off, and I went to check on the puppy...gone. It somehow managed to get out of the basket and jump out of the moving vehicle. Id say Im sad, but it must have been a pretty dumb dog for that to happen. So, puppy, I miss you, and love you, wish you all the best, and hope you are still alive somewhere. Oh, and I'm mad at you for abandoning me. Jerk.

Now, I am in Tamba, trying to decide how to manage my time this week. My family is worried about why I have been gone so long. I tried to explain, but mostly my dad was just mad that I am not there (not sure why?) but I could really use some time to relax for a day now that this is all taken care of, and I will no longer have easy internet/etc. near my site (no computer anymore). I have started looking at grad schools and am really excited! Its time to start getting organized, and officially apply in a few months. I also offered to help install new volunteers this week, which is two hours closer to where I am now, than my site is. I miss my family and my cat, though. Either I will go back to site tomorrow, or be gone for even another week trying to get my stuff back in order and help install the newbies.

Lastly, and yes I know this is TMI, I must have amoebas or something because Im running to the bathroom like every ten minutes. I don't know how I'm supposed to travel like this. Yeesh. So, most ridiculous week ever, I still need to get it all sorted out, but I did get to see a lot of people I hadn't seen in a long time, which was amazing! And, the Tamba house is quiet, clean, has a functional house computer, projector for movies, and super cute house cats. I think Im staying here for the day at least. THANK YOU all for reading! Life is insane here right now, but, as always, everything is fine overall : ) Have a good day!

I know this is random, but I am including a picture of my own personal Happy Place. North Carolina in the fall. This is the type of image that pops into my head when I need a mental escape (like when my puppy falls out of a friggin truck). The Happy Place also frequently involves waterfalls, fresh blueberries, coffee, and/or warm raspberry scones.

Im at my brothers cybercafe where the keys are mislabelled, the leftmost quarter inch of screen is cut off, so excuse any typos over there, and it takes Herculean strength to get the spacebar to work. Electricity is working, though, so I wont complain! I just wanted to post a couple anecdotes from this past week:

1.My host uncle, who works in Spain, is home for a month and he had a creepy old friend over the other day. I walked past them on my way to the well, and everyone told me I had to go greet him. As I made my way over, he leaned down and noisily blew his nose into his hand, then reached up and shook my hand. Then, while rubbing snot into my palm, proceeded to tell me I was pretty, propose to me, and refuse to let go for a good 30 seconds. GROSS. It would have been horribly offensive to refuse to greet him, so I didnt have much of a choice. I did turn down his marriage proposal, though.

2.While eating lunch today a chicken jumped into our bowl, followed by a cloud of sand, and my cat who was chasing it. We shooed them away and just kept eating.

3. On Sunday, I had the best beach day ever with another volunteer which involved deep fried balls of Macaroni and Cheese with ham in it, smothered in spicy garlic wing sauce, served to us in the sand, under a palm tree. That might sound gross to you, but trust me...its genius. Anyways, at the end of the day I had a really bad headache, and asked the employees at the restaurant if they had any painkillers. They offered me some Acetaminophen pills. About 10 minutes into my bike ride home, I got dizzy and lightheaded, and took a look at the pill wrapper...first ingredient Acetaminophen, Second ingredient Opium, third ingredient Caffeine. It was getting dark so I hadnochoice buttokeep biking, but it was NOT an enjoyable experience. I was afraid of traffic. Crazy pill popping French people.

4. My sister just started a study abroad program in Valpairaso, Chile, and here is her blog address: Lindseys Blog!

OK, thats all for now! Im just enjoying this last week of food before my family begins a month of fasting for Ramadan. Have a good day everyone :)

Rainy season is officially here! While my memories of last rainy season (July-September) are one big blur of long, muggy, hot, itchy, mosquito-ey days, I am super excited for it this time around. I had forgotten about the cold thunderstorms, the beautiful sky before and after a rain, the tadpole puddles, and the drastic transformation of the landscape from a sandy wasteland, to an all-out awesome jungle. There are gorgeous birds everywhere, I don't have to go to the well for water as often, and I can now plant beans, corn, okra, bissap, and moringa in my yard with little to no maintenance required!

Anyways, I've spent the past couple of weeks helping with nutritional gardening seminars in the Kaolack region. I also spent a week visiting another volunteer at her site, which was really fun : ) But, once again, I'll let photos do my talking. Enjoy!

Clouds before a storm:

Weeding the yard with a hand hoe:

The Seereer Delta, amazing saltwater/mangrove swimming spot:

Morgan's hut, and dog, Tiya (which means Peanut):

Gardening tournee:

My closest neighbors, and the awesome French ppl who own a pizza place in Mbour:

Recipe for having the most fun humanly possible:

1. Spend a year and a half in a small african village where you are perma hot and bereft of any and all lucrative dining options.

2. Take two weeks of vacation, fly to Rome, and meet your grandma, sister, uncle, brother, dad, and stepmom, all of whom you're super excited to spend time with.

3. Spend three days in Rome eating, walking like 12 miles a day, feeling like a real human in real clothes and makeup again, getting a haircut, buying nice things, and wearing yourself out seeing as much as possible in a short amount of time.

4. Travel to a GIGANTIC cruise ship with aforementioned family, get on, and go straight to the buffet that will be running 24/7 for the next week of your life.

5. Eat and drink everything you want all week with total abandon.

6. Somehow end up losing a pound for all of your gluttony, as a result of being back in civilized places where you are not forced to eat oily rice and fish all day long, and where there are fun activities available!

We had an amazing trip, and spent a ton of time just hanging out, playing chess, playing card games, going to events on the boat like bingo/trivia/concerts/ice skating shows, going ice skating and rock climbing, playing putt putt, going out dancing or to the casino at night, and sitting by the pool or visiting ports all day. We traveled from Rome to Sicily (which looked like Hawaii up around the volcano!), then Malta, Turkey, Crete, and spent a few days just sailing and looking out at gorgeous islands.

We were supposed to go to Athens, but went to Malta instead because of riots. I took one look at Malta, decided it looked too much like Africa, and spent the day at the pool/buffet with my little brother who was also more interested in swimming and eating than expanding his cultural horizons. There was sushi on the buffet one day, and I made myself a sushimountain. But, in general, every minute of the trip was a lot of fun, and we saw all kinds of amazing things, so I wont even try to recap all of it! I'll just put up some photos instead!

One last story, though, I was in the Rome airport ready to head back to Senegal, and looked around for the check in counter. Among all of the orderly lines, people quietly leaving each other enough personal space to go about their business, and stylishly dressed stick thin women/gorgeous men...one particular check in counter stood out like a sore thumb. Mine. It was an all out shouting shoving Clusterf*** I knew I was headed back to Africa the second I entered the fray. Home sweet home : )

It was hard to say goodbye and head home to Senegal, but things are back to normal now that Im safely in Dakar. When I came back here after going home for Christmas it was hard because I had been at home for a while, but the cruise just felt like vacation since it wasn't home for any of us there. Nobody was ready to go back to work, but thats the way it is! It's nice being back, I have a lot of work in front of me, and a busy couple of months coming up. Im really excited for this "Home Stretch," of nine months, where I dont plan on leaving country, and hope it will be enough time to get my projects all wrapped up. I know from experience that the time is going to fly by (well. Except for August, which is Ramadan, which is hot and muggy and sans-food) so I'll need to stay on task to get everything taken care of here, as well as start planning life when i get back. This fall I will be applying for grad schools, looking for a summer job, and planning a trip for the end of my service!

That's all for now, enjoy the photos!

After traveling for 24 hours to get back here, I sat down and took a picture to express exactly how I felt at the moment. Exhausted, hungry, and none too excited to be back in the oven that is senegal. After some sleep I jumped up, energized, in a good mood, and ready to go, but I thought I would document the moment anyways : )

Thanks for reading!!

I have a lot of potential dream jobs in mind, most involving education, marine science, and fish in some capacity. Everyone views Peace corps as a grand adventure, and a time to travel the world. But, the reality is that this is the longest I've been in one spot for two years in a long time. I may be far away from home, but am not exactly traveling around and having adventures. Well, every day is an adventure in some sense, but it's still a consistent two year experience : ) I'm not complaining, currently I'm having an amazing time here, but the best part is knowing that this experience is bringing me closer to my goals while also (hopefully) helping others' discover/work towards their own.

So, while I'm sometimes frustrated that I can't be in grad school studying subjects I'm passionate about, or applying to my dream jobs, I'll be content with posting my ideal job description that just came up online, and hope that one day I'll be accepting a position like it!

Dream Job!

If you read this whole thing you get a prize!!

People often ask what a typical day here is like, which is hard to answer because, while things dont exactly change much around here, so many random things are always waiting to jump out at you that every day is unique in its own obscure way. Since yesterday was a nice relaxing Sunday, I'll just recap it in order to give you a quick glimpse into the life of a Peace Corps Volunteer in Senegal.

The sun came up around 6:30am, waking me up since Ive been sleeping outside for the past 6 months or so (though I got rained on at 3am the other morning and had to make a mad dash into the hut, so that might be coming to an end soon). Normally I would have stayed in bed to read for another hour or so, but in a random surge of motivation, I decided to get up and take advantage of the cool morning air by going on a run. I got dressed and ready to go, but couldn't find my socks anywhere. I only have one pair, because who wears socks in Africa? I tore apart the room, and then eventually went out in the compound and asked my mom if she'd seen them. She went into her room and pulled my bright green socks out of her dresser, along with a random other sock I'd never seen before. For the record I dont think I've ever seen a Senegalese person in socks. They were all freshly cleaned from the last time she did laundry (an all-day-long process which involves washing clothes by hand in big plastic buckets). She was keeping them until I brought her my "other sock" because she was too embarassed to bring me three socks because that obviously wouldn't make any sense. That whole ordeal took about an hour, so I finally put on my two socks and went on a half hr run through the baobabs, which was beautiful! After getting back I pulled water (walk w a bucket to the well, drop a different bucket on a rope about 10m down to the water, then carry the bucket back on my head Jungle Book style), bucket bathed, and got back in bed.

My brother re-woke me up around 10 by shouting for me to come to the door of my hut, and offered me fresh Beignets (fried doughnut holes, SO GOOD) that my mom had just made for a wedding. I dragged my mat out into the backyard, french pressed some coffee, and had a banana/beignet breakfast, then read for an hour or so.

Around 11 I finally got up and went out to the field to work on a tree peppiniere (nursery) in our family's garden. Rainy season will be here in about a month, so the trees will need to be big enough by then to outplant around the village/schools.

After coming home to hide from the 1pm sun, I sat with my family under a tree and broke out my new Chess Practice book, and basically played chess against myself for a couple of hours (dont judge me) while trying to keep the kids from eating/otherwise destroying the chess pieces. We ate lunch, rice and fish out of a huge communal bowl on the ground, around 3pm, after which I retreated to my hut to watch 30 Rock for about an hour. My laptop holds about 4hrs of battery, so I have to ration out TV time : )

Around 4 I walked over to another village I'm working to set up as a new site for a future volunteer, and got some forms signed/sat through a couple of LONG meetings in Wolof which I didnt understand at all. Luckily, when I left, they gave me a huge bag of freshly picked Mangoes, so it was totally worth it. I then went on a bike ride until the sun wet down, took another bucket bath, and sat with my family until we had dinner around 9pm.

I went back to my hut, shut the door, made a cup of hot chocolate, and sat on my mat in the backyard looking up at the stars. The moon set early so the night sky was gorgeous. I called another volunteer (because its free!) and we talked until my hot chocolate was done and I couldn't keep my eyes open anymore. I got into bed, saw a shooting star, and was passed out asleep by 11pm. Fin of journee.

A couple of years ago in Hawaii, I went on a backpacking trip w a friend that landed us down at the beach. I remember one moonless night we sat looking over the ink black water, where the stars were seamlessly reflected right across the horizon. A shooting star flashed across the night sky, a perfect mirror image blazing in the water below, and we both made wishes. Even though it's bad luck to say your wish out loud, he asked what mine was, and I said "I wished that no matter what I do or where I end up, that I can always find a way to be as happy as I am right now." After a minute or two of silence, he put his arm around me and said with total confidence, "I know you will." And so far, he's been right : )

I know this is crossing the cheesy/sappy/annoying line, but, I see shooting stars all the time and they always fill me with warm fuzzies, because they remind me that no matter where you are, or what's going on in your life, it's easy to find happiness if you carry your joy around with you. Not to say that things don't go wrong all the time, or that it's bad to feel sad, angry, upset, etc. but knowing that overall a sense of humor and some unshake-able self love can float you through just about anything, makes all of those difficult experiences roll right on through. Either that, or I'm just horribly naive and/or stupid.

One of the best ways I have of gauging my mood in this country is how I feel about butterflies when I see them flying around (bear with me, where I'm going with this is slightly less gag-inducing than it sounds). If I'm in a bad mood, I look at them and immediately think, "How can anything so delicate possibly survive in this country of sandstorms, car crashes, kids who delight in killing kittens, and just overall natural tendency toward destroying...everything?" If Im in a good mood, though, I see them flying around and think, "Hey, Senegal really is kind of pretty..."

OKAY. Thats my sapfest for the day! All Im trying to say is that after a year I've figured out how to be easily happy here, and I think it's something that will stick with me for the rest of my life (inchallah). Next time I write I'll come up with something more entertaining, or perhaps even responsible and work related, to write about, I promise.

Hope youre all enjoying some warm weather in other parts of the world! Because we sure are here, ha...ha... : /

Oh! And 3 last pieces of news:

1. My sitemate just got a fancy new telescope for her roof, along with a star book!

2. Steve and I found a conveniently located amazing burger place that has PUNCH CARDS. As in...you buy 10 goat cheese or camembert hamburgers for about $4 each, and you get an 11th one free!!!

3. This morning I got like a million more ant bites, I still dont know why this happens to me, and am going straight home now to take benadryl/ibuprofen and pass out. Im definitely not in a good mood, and writing this post kind of made me cringe a little bit, but whatever. I wrote it in my notebook yesterday when my mind was in a much better place.

Anyways, thank you for reading, as always! There's not actually a prize, but, if you read this whole thing, then you must be as bored as I am, and we're clearly soulmates : ) And maybe you'll get lucky and I'll send you a little plastic army guy, 3-D glasses, or a "changes color when you put it in milk" spoon from the bottom of a cereal box.

While living without electricity can often be...inconvenient, I do constantly thank my lucky stars that my village doesnt have it. The Senegalese tend to use electricity for a few specific purposes, including blasting arabic "singing" from megaphones, running Wolof TV programs which, as far as I can tell, is just more yelling but complete with awkward visuals, blasting Akon until 5am, and for lighting up things that really dont need to be lit up. Sadly, though, somebody rented a solar panel for their wedding, which took place about 5 feet from my backyard, and blasted, "Allo, ALLO, Allo, allo, ALLOALLOALLOALLO!!!!!" for three days straight. Im not sure why they do that, but give someone a microphone in this country, and they will "sound test" allllllll day long. I was relieved when, on the third day, they randomly decided to switch to Phil Collins music. The hysteria of not sleeping for a few nights, compounded by the sight of people dancing their traditional dances to Easy Lover, left me in a fit of giggles. But, thankfully, the wedding finally ended and now we are back to peace and quiet. Alhamdoulilahi.

Ive been quite busy lately and am working on three big projects as the school year is winding down. Classes end June 10th. On the 12th Im helping out with a bed net distribution, doing a radio show on the 13th, and then muraling a campement with some of my neighbors in exchange for a free pirogue ride through the mangroves, and then heading up to Dakar for the CRUISE. Im so excited.

Thats about it for news! I saw a chicken running around the compound the other day with a bra trailing after it, after somehow getting tangled in the laundry. Yesterday another chicken had an entire headful of weave stuck to its foot while it ran around. I find these things entertaining.

Ta ta for now!

The following interaction exemplifies your typical Senegalese male:

Yesterday I rode my bike into town to buy snacks, and on the way out, I had to ride in a small margin on the side of the road because of traffic. There was a 20 something year old guy walking directly towards me, with all the space in the world to move out of my way. I would have had to ride into traffic, or off into the sandy shoulder to make way for him. Of course, being male, he decided he had superiority in this game of chicken, and since there was literally nothing I could do (and because Im basically done with trying to accomodate anyone of the Wolof persuasion) I ran straight into him. A head on bike/sai sai collision, which I won. Obviously he was angry, but what did he expect? Next time...try being respectful and move. I also got called Honk Nonk like 5 times, which literally translates to Red Ears, and is extremely offensive, think the N word in America or Mudblood in Harry Potter. I dont even get called Toubab anywhere near my village, so honk nonk so many times in one day was a LOT.

Anyways, about 10 minutes later, a kid was biking in front of me, when he made a split second decision to turn without looking. I didnt have time to stop, so I ended up jacknifing him and we both went flying off of our bikes. I looked at him and yelled, in Serere, "You dont know how to bike! You are not smart!" It wasnt exactly threatening, and hearing myself yell in Serere I started laughing, and so did he, and everyone was fine. I doubt he learned anything though. The only thing I learned...keep wearing my helmet, and just stay in Louly from now on. Ill give someone else money to go buy me snacks.

To conclude a year of being open to this culture, I can safely say that if someone offered me the option to only interact with females for the next year, I would accept in a heartbeat. Ive had enough of this male dominance thing, be it a casualty of Wolof culture, or byproduct of living in a primarily Muslim country. Someday someone is going to say (inchallah) "Sarah, I Love You," and my reaction will be to cringe and/or visibly shudder. Not to mention a marriage proposal...I might involuntary slap some poor future boyfriend in response.

Thats all for now! Things are going well, as usual, and its still hot : ) Cruise next month, woohoo!

I spent a few days last week visiting my friend David in his sereer village. In exchange for endless cookies, clif bars, coffee, oatmeal, chocolate, and beer (he has a bar IN his compound) I spent the time painting his hut as part of a major room makeover. He lives in the Sereer delta, which meant that to get to his site, we got to take a ferry : ) Much to our surprise there was a guy with an ice cream cart, so we got ice cream cones on the boat. We spent a few days painting, swimming, biking around, and it was a lot of fun! Here are some pictures of the murals:

On the way home, I got a ride with another David who was traveling around with a film crew from Dakar, working on a documentary about the life of a volunteer. On the ferry ride home, we got to wear some sweet lifejackets. Senegalese people in lifejackets...best thing ever.

That’s the extent of my news for now! I wrote a grant for funds to build a school garden, as well as take my EE club on a field trip to Botanical Gardens in Mbour. The money came in yesterday, which means lots of work over the next couple of months. But, for now, I am in Dakar for my year-in medical checkup, so if you need me, I will be sitting at the pool waiting to see if I have tuberculosis.

One question many volunteers must face at some point during their service sounds a lot like this: 'No electricity, no internet, no tv, no homework, no beer, no kitchen, no wide avenues to stroll along, and no other individuals around who speak english...how the eff am I going to stay entertained for TWO years???' Some of us go crazy, some take up a new hobby or skill such as juggling, playing an instrument, reading technical manuals to become an expert on some random thing, or biking aimlessly for 5 hours straight. Some may invent games, like the 'describe your ideal sandwich and build it in your head' game, some people read romance novels, some draw cartoons, and some make lists upon lists during the hours of the day when it is too hot to get up and do anything.

Everyone eventually develops their own strategies, but my particular one finds its origins back in the 1980's. In 1987 to be exact, when a man named Alex from Vancouver, BC, apparently took too many drugs and decided it was high time he sat down and made a coloring book titled 'Whimsical.' After passing hands for a good 20 some years, it finally reached the one person bored enough to actually color the whole friggin thing. Me. I spend many content hours listening to music and idly coloring the book. Here are some example of his fine, and somewhat terrifying, work.

Along with the coloring book, another important thing I inadvertently came by is a 5 year old beat up solar charger that the volunteer in 2006 brought with him to Louly Ngogom. It wont charge my cell phone or my laptop, but it WILL charge my ipod, which means that I can listen to podcasts whenever I want. If it werent for that, I would have no idea whats happening in the rest of the world, though I could tell you exactly who burnt their rice for lunch today in the village, and who wore what last night at Fatou's baptism. While listening to podcasts, I am free to wander around in the bush, searching for interesting specimens for my rock collection. I didnt mean to start it, but, well, here it is:

Readymade craft kits, my favorite so far being a Pirate Ship in a Bottle making kit, are especially fun. I also have some puzzles, lots of crosswords, paint by number kit, and a day to day logic puzzle calendar. Here's a small sample : )

Books are often the only entertainment option after the sun sets, since the bugs come out and its time to hide with my headlamp under a mosquito net. It doesnt even matter if there are any mosquitoes or not, because all bugs will divebomb your headlamp, and thus your face, which necessitates a protective net. I have been reading a LOT since getting here, which is really nice because I more or less gave up reading for fun all throughout university. I had so much academic reading to do, it was the last thing I wanted to spend free time on as well. I also spend a good amount of time fantasizing about life back in the US, often not intentionally, and have begun a fantasy cookbook of things that I will make when I get back. Its cathartic, since I come across recipes in Magazines which I cant actually cook right now, so at least cutting them out and putting them in a book feels semi productive :)

Having a pet is often more entertaining than having a TV back in the US, and its almost embarassing how much time I spend sitting in my yard, drinking coffee, and watching my cat. He's just so cute, and senegalese cats are strange. A lot of them sleep like this:

As far as staying motivated and in a good mood throughout the work day goes, quick ipod dance parties in our huts are a pretty important part of every Peace Corps Volunteer's service. Theyre a good way to get energized before another day of speaking another language, and navigating this crazy culture. Here's my current playlist:

Love Me Like You, The Magic Numbers

Get it Right Today, Joe Purdy

Lets Dance, David Bowie

Starstruck, Lady Gaga

Sway, Michael Buble

Beautiful, Akon

Psycho Killer, Talking Heads

Jessie's Girl, Rick Springfield

Of course, the best way to stay entertained is to get out in the community, hang out with people, do whatever theyre doing, and just generally be available. There's also work every day during the not so hot hours, to take up most of our time. I can honestly say that though I have spent many hours not particularly doing anything, I accepted long ago that this would get boring, and have therefore never felt especially bored. Boredom implies frustration and a desire to be doing something else, but Im pretty much at peace with the fact that there will always be very little going on here, and thats totally fine : )

Oh! And one last thing, I just finished working with two other volunteers to set up a website (im trying to learn some computer programming in my free time) for the kaolack girls camp. There are still some errors, but im excited about it. Here's the address, and Im pretty proud of myself for successfully making a link to it...like I said, Im learning:

Girls' Camp!

Ill leave you with this semi sarcastic list to further illustrate activities that 2 years in a hut could potentially drive you to:

1. Take advantage of free calling to phone up other volunteers and tell them about what the donkey in your compound did today...for an hour.

2. Time how long you can hold your breath for every so often. Chart all progress.

3. Consider what might happen if you were to use that epi pen Med gave you.

4. Paint nails. Wipe off. Repeat.

5. Daydream so completely that you forget where you are.

6. Sweep your yard.

7. Take a nap...again.

As always, thanks for reading!

Us volunteers spend the vast majority of our time living in villages with no electricity, running water, or entertainment outside of shelling peanuts and making fun of how fat someone's mom is...again. So, when we leave site, we need to make the most of it, which is exactly what I did this past weekend! Some of my favorite things in life are biking, fishing, cooking, hanging out at the beach, listening to music, and just sitting around with good people. I got to do all of that : )

On Friday morning I woke up early and went to Mbour. I picked up my bike and set off on a ride to Popenguine, a veritable beach paradise. It took me about an hour and a half, and along the way I picked up mangoes, peanuts, guava juice, frozen yogurt, and other amazing snacks. Im reading "Grapes of Wrath," and spent a good hour or two during the hottest time of the day sitting under a tree, snacking, reading, and drinking lots of water. This country is perfect for biking because you can buy water everywhere, there are sandwich stands and snack stands every kilometer or so, and if you get too tired and just cant keep going, you can stop right where you are and hop in the next bus that comes along.

Anyways, I arrived in Popenguine, and rode straight to a gorgeous restaurant on a cliff that looks over the ocean and serves cold beer. Between the flowering vines, steep streets leading down to the water, donkeys, and white buildings, it looks just like a greek island. Grapefruits are in season right now, so I sat down with one and did some crossword puzzles.

I hung out there with the Popenguine volunteer as other people slowly started showing up. Volunteers from Kolda, Kaolack, Dakar region, etc. all came up for a fishing weekend! We spent the night on Kelsey's (the popenguine volunteer) roof, wrapped up in burritoes of sheets and all huddled together because it was, surprisingly, freezing cold. So, like...70 degrees. Brr. We all ended up moving down to her room which, by the next morning, looked like this:

We got up early and got bean sandwiches, which is always fun. You walk around asking the random sandwich women what they have in their bowls. It ranges from beans, chick peas, onion sauce, oily macaroni, spicy tuna mush, and all costs about...50 cents.

After sandwiches we headed down to the beach and hung out waiting for the boat to leave! Here's the crew:

Once in the boat we motored out to a calm spot and dropped our lines in. Here in Senegal you fish with a line attached to a wooden paddle. No rod, bobber, etc. In a fit of over excitement to catch a fish, I pulled the line too hard and cut my finger. We decided to have a competition to see who could catch the most fish. I caught the first fish, which was the strangest looking creature ever, but that was the extent of my victories for the day : )

Last time I went fishing, I caught a lot of bright pink and orange fish. I called them lisa frank fish. I have no idea what kind they were, but they were tasty. Its a lot like Hawaii, where there is virtually no limit to which fish you can catch and eat. In Hawaii we used to catch and fry up fish that people pay hundreds of dollars to buy for their saltwater aquariums. I dont know what we were catching all day, but in the end we got about 20 some fish of three different species. Every time someone got a fish, it was really exciting. Here are some photos : )

After getting back to shore, we headed to the beach house we rented for the night, and started cleaning the fish. I made tortillas while someone else made salsa. I spent the afternoon in my bathing suit, listening to music, cooking, hanging out, and looking out over the ocean. It was pretty much perfect. We ended the evening with games on the porch, and fish quesadillas. We had way more fish than we could finish, though, so the next morning we got up and I threw all of our leftover ingredients together and made fish chowder. It was surprisingly good. More pictures!

Eventually we all got our stuff together and headed out. Steve and I had a nice lazy bike ride back to Mbour, about 30 kilometers, and met up with the new group of trainees that just arrived. We recovered from our 1pm bike ride by eating ice cream.

They were having beach day, so we sat around and talked with them about peace corps, went swimming, and had a really fun time. I like meeting all of the new people because theyre excited about being here and have so many questions and ideas. Ive ben here for long enough that it doesnt feel like Im in Africa, or a volunteer, or any of that. It just feels normal, and its nice to be reminded that this is an adventure, in a way, and that its not the norm to sleep on a cot in your backyard, speak a random language, and eat fish and rice every day : )

After beach day, I turned on my ipod, biked home, about 15k, and was happy to see my family. My cat was sitting at the door to my hut waiting for me and it was super cute. I turned on Wait Wait Dont Tell Me, laid down on my cot, and fell asleep looking up at the stars. It was such a great weekend, and now Im at the training center helping with sessions for the new group of trainees, and will be back in village soon! Im excited for the projects I have underway, and as soon as school gets out for the year in June, I am flying to Rome, meeting up with my family, and going on a mediterranean cruise. Woohoo! If you need me...Ill be at the buffet.

More updates soon, but just wanted to put this up : )

Im going fishing this weekend, I'll add pictures if I catch anything good!

In grade school when everyone went around sharing their favorite animals, I was that kid interjecting "Cuttlefish, Marten, or Genet," among all of the cats, horses, dolphins, dogs, etc. Thank you, Wildlife Fact Files. I have always wanted to see two animals in my life, one being the Hellbender Salamander, which Rachel and I saw in Summer 2008 in Pisgah National Forest. The other is a Genet Cat. That goal may or may not have been met last night around 3am.

The reason we all keep chickens in coops here is that something the Sereres in my area call a "Mbafall" will come around and slit the chickens throats. I half believed them, half thought they were talking about the ever present vampires/genies/random malicious spirits out to get us all. Well, this time they were right (Senegal 1, Yama 0). I was awoken around 3am by a bone chilling noise and subsequent struggling sounds. By this point I only had one guinea fowl because the other one escaped, which has been a source of entertainment for everyone all week. Every time we saw it, the entire village turned into a football team, chasing one birdlike ball, sprinting side to side with their arms held up in the air, running in formation...but we never caught it. So, anyways, Im in bed, jolted out of a dream, and start scrambling around for my glasses, headlamp, and cell phone w/flashlight. By the time I get it all together and get myself untangled from the mosquito net, everything is ominously still.

I saw a mound in the corner of my yard (after checking to make sure my kitten was a ok) and approached it, knowing that I was not going to like whatever I saw. It was one of the guinea fowl lying still, and I couldnt see its head, so I grabbed a rake, half shielded my eyes, my imagination running all over the place from vampires to hyenas, and slowly flipped the bird over. Throat slit, empty eyes, lolling neck. I was not going back to sleep any time soon. If ever. So I barricaded myself in the hut, turned on a podcast, and colored in my coloring book. Eventually I peeked outside again and saw two points of light shining back at me. I would have been scared out of my mind, I mean thats always creepy even if its your housecat, but a lightbulb went on in my head...its some kind of cat! A cool African cat. The options...Genet or Civet. Totally harmless for people, and it was obviously pretty small. Also, the fact that it didnt just go around indiscriminantly slitting chicken throats and not returning to eat them was somehow comforting. Something preying upon fowl I understand, something just killing them for no reason...GENIES.

So, I was kind of sad, but mostly think its cool we have a random kind of noctural cat here. I had planned on bringing the guinea to Marys wedding next weekend as a gift anyways, which would have been cooked up for us, so I wasnt emotionally attached. I still havent told my family, though...I am never going to live this down. Here is what a Genet looks like btw:

OK, secondly, THANK YOU Rachel and Ms. Bertolini for the amazing care packages!!! So much fun stuff, and it was really really nice. Getting anyting in the mail reminds me that the real world exists, and fills me with warm fuzzies : ) Thanks again!

Lastly, today the teachers are on strike, which I was (irresponsibly) happy to realize, because I woke up this morning, had my coffee, read the Silmarillion for a while, and it was so nice all I wanted to do was go on a walk. I never want to work here, all I want to do is wander around, talk to people, listen to music and podcasts, and just hang out. According the my ipod pedometer, I am averaging about 16,000 steps a day. Ive been working a lot in other villages, and walk around in my free time, so it adds up to like 6 or 7 miles.

Most people go on COS (Close of Service)trips after their two years. Like Ive mentioned, Im planning on living in Boston w Morgan for the summer, and well see if I get grad school/job after that, but, before going to Boston, I want to spend a month doing one of the following:

1. Hiking the Appalachian Trail. One month of straight up walking around in the gorgeous appalachian forest.

2. Biking down Hwy 1.

3. Going back to Switzerland for a couple of weeks and backpacking around there.

I know its not for a long time, but for now, Im pretty sure Ill end up doing some of the AT unless people are enthusiastic about going as a group elsewhere : ) We'll see! All 40 of us finish at the same time, so there will probably be a lot of ideas. The AT just sounds so awesome, though.

Spoiler Alert: Here's the end of my story before it even begins, I have my camera back, I have a healthy kitten in my hut, and I have two lovely Guinea Fowl safely in a coop in my backyard. But all of that was in doubt this week.

First of all, I returned from WAIST with no hope for the camera or my ID, when another volunteer called and said the bartender at the party found it. No idea what happened, but the point is, my faith in humanity has been restored! The money was missing from the camera case, but I dont even care, im just so happy to get the camera back.

After getting back to site, I decided to finally get some Guinea Fowl, which I have been wanting to do for about a year now. Im planning on staying at site for a good chunk of time, so I figure dthis was a good opportunity. I could have gotten chickens, but, well, Guinea Fowl make cooler noises, and they look like dinosaurs. Some people think theyre ugly...but I find them charming. Amanda came to visit during all of this, and we named them Priscilla and Quincey. See what I mean about the dinosaur thing?

So, I went into Mbour and spent an hour or so with a random guy translating everything in Serere for me while I negotiated prices and navigated the bird market which is an overwhelming place to say the least. They have everything from lovebirds to, well, Guinea Fowl. I finally settled on two, a male and female, and was handed them tied together by the feet. I walked down the street with my upside down birds on a string when I came across a guy pushing a cart covered in giant clippings of a plant Ive been meaning to collect for the school garden. He was doing trimmings for a hotel, and very nicely offered to cut up a bunch for me to plant. He even took all of the thorns off! I also had to buy groceries, so by the time I took a taxi to the garage, I was juggling two flapping birds, an armfull of wet clippings, two bags of groceries, and was covered in dirt from all of this.

I got home to find that my kitten was missing. Totally disappeared. I felt so bad!! Everyone kept saying he would come back, but my mind was teeming with horrible scenarios, so acting on Amanda's brilliant idea, I offered the kids two hundred cfa, like fifty cents, to anyone who found him. We ran all over the village, flushing out under people's beds, asking about cats, and I barely escaped being beaten with a stick by an old blind woman who thought I was a little kid looking under her bed. Eventually I went home and left the kids to it. I was brought random kittens all day, but finally a terrified child showed up holding Pippin upside down by the tail at arm's length. Kids are terrified of cats here. Im the worst pet owner ever, but Pippin recovered just fine.

I later clipped the guinea fowl's wings, and no I dont have any idea how this should be done, but did it anyways and it seems to be working. I also rigged up the ,ost jankety coop ever, which also seems to be working out fine.

However! Last night I went on a long walk and came back to find that the guineas has gone MIA. M entire famil mobilized in a parade of flashlights to search my yard, hut, village... they were literally jumping over fences to get into locked fields, including my mom who had on a skirt and a baby tied to her back. We couldnt find them anywhere. We went back for dinner and everyone was making fun of me, as people are wont to do here, about not being able to keep track of anything. I was sitting there explaining that I should never be allowed to have children because I would just lose them, when pippin chose that exact moment to wander away right under my nose. I didnt even notice. Finally someone was like...hey...your cat's escaping. Oops.

I decided to just call it a day and went into my room, sat down on my bed, and was scared half to death by a flurry of wings and squawking. The guinea fowl were on my bed, blending in with all the various crap I keep on there. I sleep outside so its just my storage space. Nobody in my family even noticed them! Needless to say, I started giggling uncontrollabl before putting them back in their coop. Which, btw, is made out of a trunk covered in advertisements for canned tuna.

Today I woke up with three healthy happy pets. I will write about work stuff later, because a LOT of exciting things are happening and deserve their own post. Also, Im at a cyber cafe and cant believe electricity hasnt cut out yet. Im writing stream of consciousness, so ignore the typos I dont have time to edit!

So. In summation:

1. Everything is going wonderfully and I have three lovely pets.

2. Guinea fowl look like both dinosaurs and random bed objects.

3. I must never, ever, be allowed to have children.

Alright. I am constantly walking a tightrope of tolerance for Senegal. Sometimes I find myself strolling along, downright loving this country. But other times I fall off into "what the eff am I doing here?" territory.

I will write a more thorough post later, but for now, here's a quick WAIST recap! All volunteers were set up with homestays, ie people nice enough to take us in for a few days, and I hit the jackpot along with three other volunteers. We are staying with a USAID worker named Meg who is amazing. She has her own apartment, a pool, a wii, nice tv, wireless, and an amazing kitchen. I woke up this morning to chocolate chip french toast with whipped cream, and a hot cup of freshly french pressed coffee : )

WAIST was an amazing couple days of wearing my enormous tutu, playing softball, seeing friends, going out at night, and just generally having the best weekend imaginable. However, when it comes to being in Dakar, its like being in an entirely different world. Not always in a good way. Far from my comfort zone and "safe place" in the village, I am just another white person as far as all Senegalese people here are concerned. So, in the span of three days, I managed to be subjected to all of the following things:

1. Guys doing maintenance on a telephone pole who decided to lift up a cable right as I walked past. I wiped out completely and it really hurt.

2. After wiping out I was solicited for sex no less than 10 times, and was shouted at by every senegalese guy for the next 100 yards. By the time we got to the bar where everyone was going out...I was pretty much in tears and convinced the girls I am staying with to just go home with me.

3. During a mid day swim in the ocean, I forgot my lessons learned living in Hawaii, and didn't pay enough attention to the rocks. I stepped on a sea urchin, and brushed a couple with my legs. The spines come right off and are currently, painfully, still stuck in my body. I got the accessible ones out, but the rest are too far in there. The guy I was swimming with got a thousand times more than I did. It looked like the most painful thing ever.

4. Last night was the biggest party of the year for peace corps senegal. I was being responsible and had my money/ID/camera all in one pocket. There was basically nobody there but other volunteers (like...200 of us) and when I went to take a picture, I realized that it had all disappeared. My brand new camera. Sometimes it can be so disheartening to live and work here, and realize that no matter how much you become a part of your own community, the minute you leave, you still have things stolen, you still get marriage proposals, and nobody takes you seriously. As a woman at least. Im really really sad that all of my pictures are gone. From home, and all weekend. I cant imagine another volunteer took it, so I assume it was someone on staff at the venue. From now on, I wont even bother owning nice things in Africa.

5. If stepping on a sea urchin wasn't enough, I was in turn stepped on by one of my friends (accidentally) and have a nasty gash on my toe from it. There is also a crater of skin missing from my pinkie toe where I slipped down the most uneven narrow dirt stairwell to ever exist. But, it wasn't just me. Everyone is sore and injured from 3 days of softball and partying. We were a rough looking crew sitting around the pool today. I think bedraggled is a good adjective for...everyone here at the moment. There are multiple pairs of crutches being passed around. Luckily Im not at that point yet...

OK, but, good news should be shared as well. I am currently wearing a fleece, comfy stretchy pants, and drinking a cup of mint tea. Instead of going out to yet another party tonight, I had dinner with some friends at a restaurant which overlooked the ocean. We watched the sun set, drank white wine, and had fresh mussels, clams, and shrimp. Best seafood ever. It was really nice : ) Dakar has been fun and exciting, and great to see everyone, but I cant wait to just get back to my family in Louly, sleep in my backyard, hang out with the kitten, and do some good hard work gardening every day. ahh, village life. Plus, I have a lot of books Im excited to start reading.

Goodnight! And thank you for reading, as always. Its my family and friends at home (as well as here) that really keep me going/happy with what Im doing. I know life is hard wherever, and mostly I just feel lucky that even though this experience comes with a lot of random frustrations...its still a life changing, amazing, fulfilling, experience : )

Random news:

1. I caught the French tourists in action with my new camera! This is a picture of how they save the world by giving the kindergarteners candy. It has become an almost daily occurrence.

2. On beach day a couple of weeks ago, Steve showed up with a kitten for me in his backpack. I named him Pippin, and he's SO cute. Here he is in Jen's lap.

3. School directors in other villages around Louly heard about the gardening project Im starting, and have begun calling/randomly showing up in my compound (totally socially acceptable behavior here)to get me to work with their schools. They don't even need funding, they just want me to help train/organize : ) Here's a picture of a garden we laid out, and the one bed I taught them how to "double dig," which is a soil improvement technique. If all goes to plan, the beds will all be dug by the time I get back to village, they will have put up a millet-stalk fence, and we'll be ready to plant veggies!

4. Steve and Jen (my two closest neighbors) came to spend the night on Friday. We did a composting lesson at the school, and then ate a TON of Yassa Poulet for dinner. And 6 bags of cookies for dessert! The kitten attacked the bowl after we finished.

5. Somebody bought the twins overalls. Its pretty much the cutest thing ever.

Thats about all for now. Things are going really well, and I am working on a more entertaining blog post for later when I have better internet : )

Hi Everyone! Exciting news all around. This is a long post, but probably the only one for a while, so read at your leisure. First of all, I made it safely back to Senegal and suffered only the mildest of cultural traumatization while transitioning back to village life. Ive been spending pretty much every afternoon wandering around and listening to episodes of “This American Life,” which is actually really fun.

While on one of my walks, two random guys around my age decided that I needed to pay attention to them and started walking with me, being obnoxious, telling me to “be at peace, we don’t want to interrupt, how are you enjoying your walk, do you have a husband? Really we don’t want to interrupt, but how are you, do you love me? etc,” the usual. Not being in the mood to deal with it I stopped, shot them the most disdainful look that I could muster, turned around, and walked purposefully into the closest building...a school compound that I’ve never visited before. I’ve been meaning to, really, but have just been lazy. Turns out, that moment may have changed my entire service! I have been trying to set up a school garden in my village, but we don’t have a wall, or a convenient water source, or motivated teachers... but the new school (1k away from me) is a magical wonderland just waiting for me to start a garden and Environmental Club. They have a fenced in area, a school wall, a robinet, a basin to hold water, motivated and french speaking teachers, and even a cement chicken coop. All they need is someone to organize it! I cant wait.

In other news, I wrote a couple of articles for our volunteer newsletter. Ill put in the first one on here. I also decided to run for a coordinating position for SeneGAD, which is the country wide gender and development program. Elections are in a couple of weeks, I’ll let you know what happens! And speaking of things coming up soon, it is time to tell you about WAIST. The West African Invitational Softball Tournament. It is basically a huge get together for all volunteers in Senegal and neighboring countries. We are split up into softball teams based on region, and each team has a theme complete with costumes. This year the Kaolack team (mine) will be ballerinas. I will be sure to put up pictures afterward. There is also a talent show, photo contest, huge all night party, and we are all really excited! It’s an excuse to see people who live far away, other volunteers I only see every 3 or 4 months. I cant wait!

In other plans, I have Star Wars valentines that I will be handing out in a couple weeks, and am doing a radio show along with some of the other Sereer speakers on the 14th. Morgan and I will be having fancy sunset dinner and wine on the Kaolack house roof to celebrate our total lack of viable romance options here in Peace Corps Senegal. I think its going to be really fun, actually : )

OK, here some pictures from village, as well as the newsletter article I wrote. I hope youre all doing well, and am already getting excited for a family Mediterranean cruise this summer. Happy February, and since I wont talk to many of you until then, Happy Valentine’s Day!!

Random Photos:

Laundry Time

Steve's Birthday Burger

Sheep

Dakar Traffic Jam

Mantis of some kind

Flower of some kind

Kids at the Yekini parade, wearing Yekini crowns

Sabaar (article) and photos:

Out of Site, Out of Mind.

A phenomenon known as "Site Guilt," generally follows us PCV's around when we leave our villages to partake in the regional house or Dakar high life. It usually manifests itself as a nagging in the back of our hungover minds as we turn on a 5th consecutive episode of Glee, pop open a cold Flag, and thank Allah for elastic waistbands while starting in on that second bean/egg/mayonnaise/sauce soble/french fry sandwich. We tell ourselves, "Hey, I'll go back to site tomorrow, this time with the best sariche ever," right before we re enter the sloth cycle until the entire regional house clears itself out in a collective surge of motivation. We show up at our sites a week later toting a 150cfa bag of beignets, compliments of that guy shouting at our alham window.

However, I've been out of site for a few weeks now, and am happy to report that site guilt does NOT follow you to America. It doesn't have a passport and probably gets cut off somewhere around Bermuda as you down that second bottle of free champagne. Sorry, sparkling wine. However, some vestiges of Peace Corps life have definitely crossed the pond with me over this holiday vacation. A total lack of self restraint, for example. It's hard to convince yourself that you don’t, in fact, need that gigantic piece of cake because, hey, you won’t have the option of cake for the next year and a half. Better to eat it now while you can. I want two years of America concentrated into a one month span, and I'd say it's going quite well so far. Embracing gluttony is a lovely thing, but is definitely best reserved for the holiday season. It would be hard to maintain as a lifelong thing (financially and physically) and really....what other choice do you have when surrounded by Christmas buffets? I know we've been out of the US for a while, but it was still shocking when I came home to find out that cookies have, in fact, learned to talk! I look at them and all I hear is, "you live in Africa...eeeeat meeeee..."

So, in a few weeks when they roll me onto that plane and heft me back to Senegal...sure it will be hard to say goodbye again, so I’m doing my best to enjoy every possible moment of US time while I can, which, let's face it, isn't difficult. Because really, when will we ever have the chance to just sit around all day, cook whatever we want, hang out with our favorite people, and enjoy a total lack of responsibility ever again? Unless you count being unemployed. I would tell myself that when I get back I'll do more work, be a better volunteer, and make up for all of this time at home. But, again, there is no site guilt in the US of A. Unjustified vacation can truly be a wonderful thing. So, enjoy that time at home, love your vacations for all they’re worth, and trust that you will be just as good of a volunteer when you get back…maybe just slightly more rotund. Which will only make you that much more popular in the village.

Oh, and you can't forget Goal Three of Peace Corps. Fine wine and the joy that comes from a plate loaded down with holiday goodies can really improve your conversational skills. People actually want to hear about Peace Corps, and the longer you tell them about Senegal, the longer they keep serving you food. I rest my case. Happy Holidays.

Well my vacation is ending in about 45 minutes. After that it's back to the grind...sitting on the beach, swimming at the American Club, planting gardens, painting murals, and playing with kids. Such a hard life. Anyways, I am terrified of flying over the ocean (for no real reason, I guess it's no different than flying over land) but after Im done with Peace Corps Im moving back to North America and staying put. Maybe they will be playing some good movies...

Anyways, here's a Christmas morning picture to say goodbye! I'll talk to you all in Senegal, when I have a chance to get online. ttfn.

Well Well. It's time to leave the land of luxury, and go back to showering out of a bucket and eating with my hand. But first Im going to sit in Dakar, in my new bathing suit, in total denial that I am not just on a week long vacation : ) Then I'll get back to saving the world.

I find myself in exactly the same position I was in 10 months ago, thinking: What in the world shall I pack to leave for Senegal?

Luckily, this time it’s not as big of a deal since most of my stuff is already over there. However, there is limited bag space and Im determined to make the most of it. When I first left for Peace Corps, I threw whatever seemed useful into my bag, not very intentionally. The result? I showed up without a single skirt or tanktop, and a lot of useless crap, basically. So, I thought Id share my lessons with the new people who are preparing to leave in a couple months, as well as give the rest of you a glimpse into my suitcase. In case you ever decide to spend two years in a West African village : )

Useful/wonderful things:

*Extra money. Like one hundred dolla billzzz. You aren’t used to living at village standards yet, and will probably have forgotten a lot of stuff. You absolutely don’t need extra money, but having some was awesome. That way you can buy things in Thies to bring to your site.

*Craft supplies. Lots of them. They will come in handy. At some point.

*A French press if you like coffee. I have a cheap glass one from target, but I think REI makes unbreakable ones for camping. Which is pretty much what you’ll be doing for the next two years.

*A netbook and a hard drive.

*A digital camera. Duh.

*Good Liquor. Even if you don’t like drinking that much, its not available in Senegal, and is nice to have at the regional house. Over two years, somebody will surely appreciate it.

*A pocketknife and duct tape.

*Toiletries! Like, nice smelling body lotion and shower stuff for when you want to feel like a real person.

*A sewing kit. Just a little one.

*A heavy blanket or sleeping bag. It does get cold at night. Sometimes.

*A bathing suit, or two.

*A quick dry towel. They are lovely.

*Costumes. ALL costumes. Wigs, petticoats, sparkly jumpsuits, whatever.

*Entertainment. For example, paint by number kits, crosswords, puzzles, books, etc.

*Settlers of Catan. I would really like you to bring that. With an extension pack. And then make sure you're placed in the Kaolack region.

Things you really don’t need:

*Too many clothes. You will acquire a ton of them here, and you can get pretty much anything made.

*Instant coffee, a la nescafe. There is plenty of it here, trust me.

*Vitamins. Med will give you enough Prenatals to grow a baby the wholesome way.

*A blowdryer. Africa is a blowdryer.

*Socks. Unless you are Chris Peterson.

*Enough pens for an army. I came laden with enough pens to last me two years. I don’t know why I thought Senegal wouldn’t have pens. They do, they most certainly do.

*Candy for kids. Just don’t do it...all they eat is sugar anyways.

*You can leave your palm oil, your dried fish, and your plain white rice at home.

*Peanuts.

*Toilet Paper. I mean...come on.

Ok thats all I can think of right now! Im not sure Im a good person to take advice from, though, since I am heading back with half my backpack taken up by a gigantic pink petticoat (WAIST here I come!) which my sister decided to buy for me in lieu of depositing the money into my bank account a few years ago, thank you, lindsey...and a piece of Zingerman's Hummingbird Cake for my site mate. mmmmm. That may not survive. I might eat it en route.

Tonight, my grandma and I are getting dressed to the nines, drinking mimosas, and watching movies to ring in the New Year. Not the exciting going out dancing all night of last year, but I cant really think of a better way to spend the evening : )

I am heading back to Senegal in a few days. Im not exactly ready, but I cant say they'll have to be drag me kicking and screaming onto the plane. Everyone will go back to work, and sitting around the house doing nothing would probably get old eventually...

Being back here for a month made me realize what it is exactly that I miss the most about home. I thought it would be the food, the weather, my family, etc. But, the result was something I didnt expect. While I do miss all of that, the thing I miss the most, and what I look forward to the most when I get back here (you know, in 2012) is having a life. Seriously. In Senegal, work is life. Im not saying I have a ton of work to do, but I live and work in the same place. My personal and professional life are one and the same. I am ON 24/7.

I loved living in Victoria because I could take yoga classes, play ultimate frisbee, go to salsa lessons, volunteer at a gorgeous ocean discovery center, go to midnight swims at the community center, and just generally have a good time. Even work was pretty fun. In Peace Corps, though, it's like being transported back to middle school in terms of freedom and options of things to do. Except...in Africa with a bunch of random Senegalese people. I spend my time with the family, eat when they do, eat whatever they're eating, always tell them where Im going and when I'll be back, have limited internet and TV time(ie. none)and never leave the compound after dark.

I dont mean to complain, I like my work over there and knew it would be like this. We have regional houses to take breaks when we need it, and get non-village work done. It's just a much slower and different pace of life. I am enjoying it now, but when I get back...Im going to boycott sitting and reading. Im going to do as much as humanly possible. Pottery classes, a computer programming class, ultimate frisbee, a fun job, long walks, yoga, swing dancing, hiking on weekends. Hopefully in Boston. For Summer of Fun! After summer of fun...Im thinking graduate school. Or a job. We'll see. Anything could happen in the next 15 months. Who knows, I might even become fluent in Serere. And I know that makes you jealous.

There have been two previous volunteers at my site, two years each. One of them wrote a blog, and it's like someone took my diary and posted it online. Same experiences, same frustrations, same everything. It's kind of awesome, and also really weird to think how we have lived pretty much the exact same life, just two years removed. He even had just as many mouse problems as I did. Go back to earlier entries and take a look. I assume his more recent ones are glimpses into my future as a volunteer in Louly : ) Here's the link:

http://czcarpenter.blogspot.com

And, lastly, MERRY CHRISTMAS in a couple of days! Im looking forward to christmas breakfast, my stocking, family, and of course, presents! Yay!

A phenomenon known as "Site Guilt," generally follows PCV's around when we leave our villages to partake in the regional house or Dakar high life (ha...ha...). It usually manifests itself as a nagging in the back of our minds as we turn on a 5th consecutive episode of glee, pop open a cold Flag, and let out our panyas a little to make room for that second bean/egg/mayonnaise/sauce soble/french fry sandwich.

I've been out of site for a few weeks now, and am happy to report that site guilt does NOT follow you to America. It doesn't have a passport, and gets cut off somewhere around Bermuda, I would guess. However, some vestiges of Peace Corps life have definetly crossed the pond with me. A total lack of self restraint, for example. It's hard to convince yourself that you dont, in fact, need that gigantic peice of cake because, hey, you wont have the option of cake for the next year and a half. Better just eat it now while you can. I want two years of America concentrated into a one month span, and I'd say it's going quite well. Embracing gluttony is a lovely thing, but is definetly best reserved for the holidays. It would be hard to maintain as a lifelong thing (financially and physically) and really....what other choice do you have when surrounded by Christmas buffets? And also, when did cookies learn to talk? I look at them and all I hear is, "you live in Africa...eeeeat meeeee..."

So, in a few weeks when they roll me onto that plane and heft me back to Senegal...it's going to be hard, but Im doing my best to enjoy every possible moment of US time while I can : D Because really, I'll never have the chance to just sit around all day, cook whatever I want, hang out with my favorite people, and enjoy a total lack of responsibility ever again.

One more thing, a lot of people ask me what shocked me the most going into Peace Corps, and what I noticed first coming back. There are a number of things but the first things that come to mind:

Going to Senegal-Guys there are annoying. Like...really annoying. Im sure there are some exceptions, but I haven't met very many of them. Sorry.

Coming back-Everyone looks different. Different clothes, different colored eyes, different skin colors, different hairstyles. Everyone looks more or less the same in Senegal (no offense Senegal). So much so, that its totally OK to shout at someone for looking different. In the US, everyone belongs in some way, and that is just one more reason to love it.

Im at home! America is *literally* the best. I have been sitting around in my giant fuzzy bathrobe and sweatpants all day every day : ) This evening, Connor and I made paper airplanes before we all sat down in front of the fireplace to watch a Christmas movie. Last night I baked three pies and trays upon trays of sweet potato fries at a friend's house for a big dinner party. I also went to curves with Sheila, spent a day making crab cakes with cousin Ken, and am generally just having the best vacation ever.

Nana and Lindsey get here next week, Connor is off from school, and It's COLD which is fantastic. I love my family, I love snow, I love the US, and I love Christmas! Here's to one month of doing nothing but relaxing, eating, and spending time with everyone! I'll put the hot sandy Senegal picture back up on my title when I go back. For now....SNOW. !!!

Also, not related, Im jealous of this guy....that's awesome. I hope I catch something ridiculous while fishing one day. Like when Steve caught a crazy looking triggerfish by the TAIL in Popenguine : ) Hehe.

I am going home for Christmas in less than 48 hours! Most of all, I can't wait to see family, see snow, be surrounded by Christmas decorations, eat good food, and just relax. Knowing that I am about to leave has changed my perspective on life in Senegal over the past few weeks. I've started noticing the things I love and appreciate here, and the thngs I will be happy to leave behind for a month : )

I wont mind leaving behind the bugs, the heat, the constant back and forth between overwhelming volunteer events and quiet village life, the language barrier, the feeling of sticking out like a sore thumb no matter where I am, the monotonous food, the lack of activity between 12-3pm, and the constant requests for money.

I will miss (well. not miss exactly, but things that I will be happy to come back to) include: my open air shower, the warm palm tree covered beach, my incredibly cute siblings here, my projects that are just getting underway, other PCV's, wearing flip flops every day, never being concerned with what I look like, total independence and freedom, my lovely village, the kindergarten, and not having constant internet/tv/etc. stimulation (I know its inconvenient, but It's pretty nice : ).

Im excited to go home, will be happy to come back, and am just generally looking forward to these next few months!

On another note, I went into Kaolack for Thanksgiving, where we made a HUGE dinner with all of your typical American food, which was fantastic. Then, I headed to my friend Morgan's site to help her paint her hut. It sounds simple, but we somehow ended up with whitewash in pellet form, which we had to mix on our own. Life without google is interesting. So, we painted a wall with what looked like plain water...seriously, it wasn't white, it just looked wet. Then, sat and watched it turn white over the next hour. Throughout the day we both ended up with quick lyme in our eyes, and managed to get the hut covered in uneven shades of streaky whitewash. We celebrated by going swimming in the delta. We were walking home in the dark, when a beetle flew INTO my eye. I couldnt see it or get it out...it was crawling around in there while I freaked out. Morgan was kind enough to confront her fear of eye-touching, and saved me. She also pops out mango flies in my dreams. I would probably, literally, fall apart without her.

Anyways, when I headed back to site, I hopped in a crowded station wagon with a few Senegalese families. There is one main road that cuts through Senegal, and another volunteer who lives along that road owed me some money from Thanksgiving dinner. We decided to try a roadside handoff. 20k before we tried to meet, our car screeched to a halt and a random woman ran up to the window, handed someone in our car a baby and a suitcase, and we sped off. I asked them to stop at the white person, so everyone in the car sat with their eyes to the windows searching, until we saw her. We slammed on the breaks as she came sprinting up to the car, threw me money, and we continued on our way.

Back at site, things were just fine. I left in a rush to get to an all volunteer conference in Thies, afer which I came to Dakar, and have been playing the role of tourist ever since!

Ok, ttfn. See you in America!

The more time I spend in village, the more entrenched I get in my routine of waking up, pulling water, sitting around talking to people all day, going to bed soon after the sun goes down, and showering out of a bucket. It becomes easy to forget the fact that I live on the national road, and am only a 30 minute car ride away from a major tourist destination.

Enter tourist season. And the subsequent bursting of my happy village bubble. I sensed that my quiet life was about to change drastically when I saw the first unnaturally tanned woman fly by my site on an ATV wearing platform sandals and short shorts (keep in mind, this is a predominately Muslim country. The only short shorts here come directly from France).

As the days pass, more and more white people (toubabs) are popping up all over the place. When I go to check my mail in Mbour, I see carfulls of them in their safari hats and sweat wicking fabric. The most recent development has been the daily tour groups who get carted straight to my village where they get to see the "real" Senegal. They come in groups of 10-20 to hang out at the kindergarten, walk around the village, and stare at me (random toubab) doing weird things and speaking the local language.

The latest incident...I was planting a papaya tree with my headphones on, and back turned to the Kindergarten. When I looked up, there were 4 French families (kids and all) staring at me. I was wearing my typical Peace Corps uniform of dirty capri pants and the same shirt I've had on for the past few days. Needless to say, I felt awkward. Then, yesterday, I was hanging out with the kindergarten teachers, when the tourists showed up. They all stood around, dispensing random health advice in French (there are only like 5 people in the village who speak French btw) in condescending tones to the women who I have come to know as my friends. I know the tourists just see them as...you know...uneducated African villagers. Anyways, I was holding a baby, when it started spitting up on me. No big deal, except two of the French guys started videotaping it. Really?? One of the women in my village then asked me, in Serere, if babies in the US spit up too. I told her that all babies in the world spit up. She had a fit of giggles over that comment. There are some parts of Senegalese humor that I will just never understand. Somewhere in the world, that interaction is recorded on videotape for a guy's family to watch as he narrates his trip to Africa.

The worst, though, is their incessant need to hand out candy. This is why we volunteers get harassed by kids for gifts, candy, money, etc. You know those signs that say, "please don't feed the birds?" Same thing. Candy is bad for kids, who are generally malnourished anyways, and it makes my life significantly less pleasant. So, if you are a French tourist reading this, and you want to do some real good in Africa...search for the random dirty white person in the rural village you are visiting and give them copious amounts of nice French wine and cheese. It will go a long way. And we thank you.

Just for the record, I have nothing against the French. Just tourists. Even in Hawaii, the aloha shirt wearing tourists insisted on getting in the way of any and all work projects. I know you're on vacation, but the world is not your personal Disneyland. It may be hard to believe, but when you see a coned off area on the edge of a volcanic crater, with rappelling gear set up over the side of a 500 ft. cliff...the person dangling in the air below is NOT going to appreciate your walking into the whole operation, grabbing the rope and asking, "So! What are you guys doing?"

Jeez. I wish I had a camera. I would dearly love to take pictures back at them.

YAYAYAYAY. I hope this doesnt lead you to think that Im not enjoying it here, Im just really excited to spend Christmas at home. Last year I spent Chrismas out in Victoria, changing blackberry branches in a tank of giant stickbugs, before watching movies with my boyfriend's japanese room mate. It was actually pretty fun, but it will be nice to go home...and see SNOW. Also, I have a six hour layover in DC, ahem...CLAIRE, which means lots of time to drink Starbucks and contemplate life or something.

Ill be there on the tenth :) I have absolutely nothing planned. Its going to be wonderful.

Anyways, life here has been especially fun lately. Ive been spending time with my family, playing with the kids, harvesting peanuts along with the whole village, hanging out with Steve and Jen in Mbour, practicing french at the Poste de Sante, and actually getting work done. I dont know what happened, I think maybe hanging out with my family in the fields more, but I feel a lot more involved in life here now. Rainy season ended, and its really pretty right now. Kindergarten also started, and now that I know who all the kids are, its really fun to hang out there.

Not much else to report :) I accidentally made all of the new volunteers dip their carrot sticks in a pot of cookie dough because I thought it was hummus. They were too polite to say anything. Oops...welcome to Peace Corps. And I thought it was pretty good, anyways.

These next few months are going to be nice, I have some exciting projects planned. Then Thanksgiving, a week of causaries at the health post, All Volunteer conference, Dakar, and then....Home!

About 60 new volunteers just installed at their new sites all over Senegal, officially promoting my group from our position as the newest volunteers in country, to something more like...sophomores. It feels kind of nice.

On another note, I am going to be Ziggy Stardust for Halloween. Hopefully somebody with a camera will be around, and I can steal their pictures. Until then, I am going back to site to have a huge community meeting that will hopefully set the agenda for the next year and a half. Ive been here almost 8 months, which is hard to grasp. It often feels like I just arrived, but I have enough freckles these days to prove that's not the case. I spent this past week visiting some other volunteers at their sites, which has become one of my favorite things to do. I love hearing other languages, seeing how they interact with their families, helping out where I can, and seeing the projects everyone has been working on. Its a great way to see the country, and get ideas. And its fun.

Now that it's mid October, my absolute favorite time of the year back at home, all I can think about is wanting to drink hot apple cider on a cold day, go hiking in color changing woods, buy fresh apples at the farmers market, buy bulk candy, and eat pumpkin doughnuts from washtenaw dairy. mmmm.

Oh well. Pictures coming soon! Probably in November. Have a good Halloween!!

Im serious. Last week, during my BEST BDAY EVER (besides the fact that I missed family and fiends at home) I was dancing around in a dress with large pockets. Somebody had bought me a hamburger, and I was saving it for later in one of those pockets. Then, as I left the restaurant where we had been dancing, I noticed it was no longer there. A sketchy senegalese man was sitting off to the side eating it and staring at me. I let it go. I pick my battles...but I really wanted that hamburger.

Anyways, last week all of the Health and Environmental Ed volunteers had a summit. We were staying in a huge house that didnt have water, was really hot, and had nowhere to hang mosquito nets. It was pretty miserable, so on my birthday our boss announced that we were being moved to an incredibly fancy beachfront hotel that was originally out of the price range, but had agreed to give us a deal if we promised to buy drinks with our increased daily allowance. OKAY. I was surrounded by all of my favorite people here, and wearing the flashing light up crown that Nana sent me in the mail, along with the plastic beads and stickers she sent (THANK YOU!). Everyone bought me whatever I wanted from the bar which means I had Baileys and Espresso all evening while swimming around in a pool on the beach underneath gorgeous palm trees. Then we went to a really good restaurant where some of the other volunteers had baked me a cake from scratch. it tasted more like a big doughnut than a cake, which was great : ) Then 50's music randomly began playing and we had a big swing dance party. Afterwards, I went back to my nice hotel room with a fan and running water, and peacefully slept my way into being 24 years old.

On another note, it is harvest season here in Senegal! Before coming here I never really understood how peanuts worked/grew, but I was imagining some kind of bush with peanuts hanging off of it. In reality, though, they are pretty amazing plants because they literally plant themselves. The flower is pollinated, then the soon-to-be-seed drops down to the root, and the seed (peanut) grows down there underground. Each plant has like 20 peanuts on it. So, for the past week or so everyone has been walking out into the fields, pulling up peanut plants, and popping the peanuts off to eat right there. I like walking the super cute 2 yr old twins at my house out into the field and collecting peanuts with them. I also taught them you can eat greenbeans raw (ie. not boiled in oil). Score one for nutrition.

Here is a stolen image of a peanut plant:

And one last thing, school was supposed to start the other day, but the houses that were built for the new teachers to come and live in are currently being occupied by a guy and his family. He refuses to move. School turned into a major shouting match between him and the rest of the village leaders (and a random french woman who showed up out of nowhere with a catholic nun, and disappeared after the meeting). I think they agreed to let his family stay in the houses (no idea why, or what that means for school ever starting) but they decided that he owes the village leaders 2 liters of wine and a cooler of beer for ruining their day. I love sereres. And am endlessly frustrated by them. Whatever.

It occurred to me that in my relentless praising of Dakar, I have neglected to write about my actual job/project/etc. So, first of all, my position is as an Environmental Education Volunteer. With that title, you would think that I have specific hours and work in a school, but that's not the case. I have zero structure to my job, meaning I am totally in charge of deciding what I want to do and when. In trainings, we are provided with language, a history of the area and natural environment, and tools to work with the community to meet environmental and health needs.

So, basically, I spend my time getting to know the language and the village. I hang out with eveyone, talk about what is important to them, what they want to see change, and what their ideas are. I take those ideas, hold meetings, identify needs and wants, along with what is feasible, and try and put it all into action. So far, that has basically been me just wandering around and helping people plant trees in their compounds, while taking the excuse to sit and get to know them. 500 people in a village sounds small, but when it comes to establishing personal connections...that's like my entire high school class. I didn't know them all. Im sure that had everything to do with sheer numbers, and not the fact that I had braces, bangs, enormous glasses, a puffy yellow jacket, loved biology, was some kind of french club officer and...enjoyed Star Wars more than your average person.

Anyways, thats my job! I plant trees, am turning into one big freckle, am getting ready for the school year when I will have an EE club, and probably a lot more to do. For now, though, here's an account of my last day in village before coming here to Dakar where I will enjoy a week of air conditioning, eating good food, and speaking english (sorry,I cant help it, Dakar is paradise. Tonight we are playing ultimate frisbee with ex-pats and then going to happy hour).

A few days ago I woke up and pulled water at the well, and then sat down to make coffee and read. By 10am it felt like an oven, so I just laid around in the shade with my family, picking apart leaves for leaf sauce that night. Luckily, around 1pm the sky split open and a massive storm ensued. It got cold enough to function, so after the deulge, I went over to a friend's house because she had offered to teach me how to cook bean sandwiches and make mayonnaise. I had bought the supplies days before, and was waiting to get the energy to actually go over there. So, we spent the evening in her little shack of a kitchen, cutting up onions, cooking the beans (that I had picked from my garden a few days before) and talking. By the time the sun was setting, she and her sister had wrapped up the finished beans and mayonnaise in bowls,and tied it with a cloth for me to carry home. All of the women were making comments about how im senegalese now, and can cook, and were being really fun and friendly. I have been at site for a while now and am starting to understand most of whats going on around me, and much to everyone's surprise, I wedged my way into a conversation and made a joke...and thought they were all gong to die from laughing so much. I was SO PROUD of myself. I would translate it, but its not funny in english.

Basically the point of the story is that as I walked home in the setting sun along the road, looking out over the baobab trees lit up in the evening light, carrying my little sandwich bundle in my arms...I couldn't stop smiling. I learned to cook my favorite food, I spent a whole day hanging out with the women and having fun, and even reached an understanding of the language enough to let my personality come through for a second. I am not here to make any environmental waves, or to "save the world" as it were, but to learn how to be happy no matter where I am, to relate to people across any barrier, and to generally try to make everyone around me's life a little bit better, or make them a little bit happier. That's not exactly a job, persay, or something you could put on a resume and get paid for...but thats why Im a volunteer : ) And thats why I think Peace Corps works. You have freedom to make it your own, and do the best you can, whether its through building personal reltionships, informal education, or developing large scale projects to help make everyone's life just a little bit better.

On a different note, Ive read 17 books so far. 10 of those were in the past 2 weeks. Its hot. I have been slacking off. Here are some really good ones I recommend!

The Help-Kathryn Stockett

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle-Barbara Kingsolver

Zorro-Isabel Allende

Snow Falling on Cedars-David Guterson

East of Eden-John Steinbeck

OK. Have a good day!

Not at site, but im in Dakar : ) It has been miserably hot for the past month. Too hot to travel. Except for a 5 minute window of internet a few days ago at the cyber cafe...I havent checked email or left my village for three weeks. I'll do a real blog post tomorrow, but for now the laptop is dying so i will leave you with a quick anecdote. Last night my 2 year old sister was playing with a new "toy" that one of the other kids had scrounged up. It was a heavy duty chain with a padlock attached to the end. Someone has managed to attach a knife blade to the padlock...which my sister was happily sucking on. I didn't intervene. She was fine. But, I dont think Louly is ready for electricity...god knows what would happen if electric outlets were introduced into daily life.

I'll write soon! Things are going really well!

Today I went to the bank to pick up a money order, and along with the cash the attendant pushed a box of fresh dates through the hole in the bulletproof window. She told me it was a gift from the bank, a promotion if you will, where customers get free dates for doing money orders with them. Sometimes....I really love Senegal. Between things like that, and people getting into heated debates about how many times is the correct number to chew a certain brand of candy before swallowing it...it's hard to imagine that this country could ever get into serious conflict or break out into any sort of mass violence. They would get stuck making fun of each other for looking ridiculous in their army uniforms. Or over what the uniforms should look like in the first place. Or what is the proper angle at which to hold a gun. Even the ethnic groups just jokingly make fun of each other and go on their way laughing.

Anyways, I have spent the past few days visiting another volunteer under the pretense of painting a mural. But, she has one of the few other Sereer sites, and it's been rainy and slow lately, so mostly we were just hanging out, practicing language, and swimming. However, at some point we realized we would get stuck there, because the rain was flooding the hour long walk to her road town, so we trudged our way out to a bus in water up to our knees, and came back to Kaolack (the regional house). I spent all day buying gifts in the marketplace, which is an all out jungle of bright fabrics, jewelry, people shouting and bargaining, and shoving random things you could never need into your face. It's fun when you're in the right mood.

Korite, the end of Ramadan (one month of fasting) is coming up and everybody is preparing for huge parties where countless sheep and goats will meet their untimely death. I however, am taking a day off with a couple of other volunteers before heading back to site, to watch the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy , projected on a wall. Extended editions. This is only possible when a few select people are in the house.

Once back at site, I have been given money by Associated projects (http://appropriateprojects.com/node/323) to start building well covers. Between that, planting all of the trees Ive grown, language learning, and compound gardens, this month will go by quickly bringing us to...my 24th birthday!! All Health and Environmental Education volunteers have a summit October 5th and 6th, followed by three days of birthdays. We're all headed to Dakar for Ice Cream and fun. I cant wait. Can you tell I love Dakar? I do.

I know that, as a virtue of being a redhead, I have sensitive skin. However. I thought it was only relevant to sun exposure. But, Africa is full of surprises! I have not suffered any major sunburns, but have somehow managed to develop the amazing ability to be allergic to everything in this country. You may remember the ant incident.

I got back from English camp one week ago and hit the ground running as far as projects go. I was busy and had work to do, was waking up at 5am every day to eat breakfast and fast with my family, and was enjoying hanging out in the village. But, the day I got back a small itchy spot appeared on my waist, and has since puffed itself up and marched itself right across my entire body. I feel fine, just extremely itchy. I called Med and landed myself back here in Dakar. They confirmed...it is an allergy to SOMEthing. No idea what, here are some meds to reduce the swellng, and try to avoid that as-yet-unidentified thing from now on. So, now I am sitting somewhat uselessly in Dakar waiting for the swelling to at least start receding (rather than spreading as it is still doing) so I can go back to site. I also lost my camera/probably had it stolen : ( Im really sad about that, I had some good pictures on there. Oh! And random keys on my computer have stopped working. It is not a good week for technology. In all honesty, though, I knew from the get-go that anything I brought here was liable to be destroyed/lost/stolen, etc. Here's to trying not to get attached to material goods : )

Speaking of things being destroyed, one of my friends accidentally left a bag of bananas in my hut three weeks ago before we all went to training in Thies. I got back to find that the bag of bananas had been on top of all my language notebooks. Over those three weeks, the notebooks were slowly transformed into a sludgy puddle of glop crawling with maggots. Yuck. If you ever want to slowly destroy something, that is an especially interesting way to do so.

Okay! Sorry, most of that was bad news. The GOOD news is that I finally got the Chef du Village to have a meeting with me and I am going to start two projects soon! Im excited about them, and am writing grants for them now. We also got free calling to other volunteers on our cell phones, so my life got a LOT more fun and interesting : ) I also got some amazing care packages including FIVE POUNDS of starbucks coffee from Cory and a lot of pictures/fun stuff from Dad and Sheila. Thank you : D

Along the lines of good news, here are some random funny things that make me laugh. Some of them are stories from other volunteers:

1. I was sitting at a cafe this morning, reveling in the luxuries of fresh espresso and air conditioning, when the waitress walked up to me with a broom, pointed to the sand-covered area under my feet, and asked me to get up so she could sweep up after me. oops.

2. Another volunteer went to take a shower in the dark, scooped up a cupfull of water, and splashed it onto her face. It wasn't the bucket of clean water. It was the family's dirty cooking water. Hello face-ful of fish scales.

3. One time a darling sister of mine back home in NC was shopping at the salvation army, when someone apparently got frustrated with her slow perusing, and literally started nudging her with their shopping cart so she would get out of the way.

4. One of the other volunteers was eating at the bowl with her family, where there were small fish strewn about on top of the rice. Her dad was eating them whole, and in total surrender to this experience, a switch clicked in her brain and told her to just go for it. So, she spooned up a fish and put it in her mouth. Whole. Eyes, bones, and everything. I believe she regrets that decision now.

5. The weather seems to have absolutely no influence on what people wear here. I saw a kid wearing a puffy down jacket, jeans, and a wool cap today. His friend was barefoot and wearing nothing but a pair of ladies shorts. It looks like everyone woke up, picked their favorite kind of weather, and decided to dress for it regardless of what the rest of the world is doing. There are a lot of clashing prints, sequins, high heels, bling, and ironic cast-off T shirts. Such as "Brighton Cheerleading, Tiffany!" or "If you bug me, Im going back to Senegal." Gender also has little to no impact on clothing choice as well. If you are a guy and you like pink silk shirts...it's all fair game. It's entertaining, and fun because nobody expects me to look functional.

6. People wash their animals in the ocean. I can't tell you how many boys I have seen running joyously towards the water and swimming out into the waves, dragging one or two protesting sheep behind them. It is a huge spectacle to see them wash their sheep/horses/goats/dogs down while both tread water out in the open sea. It inevitably looks like one of them, person or the animal you pick, is being attacked by a strange sea monster.

I can't think of anything else right now! Hopefully I will get back to site soon, and get some work done! Thanks again for reading, as always : )

I have spent the past week teaching an English Camp in Dakar, which was incredibly refreshing as far as work goes. It can be frustrating in village to work with teachers who are not very motivated and are not from the community. The teaching system here is interesting. Some teachers go through training, but others just work for long enough to be considered a legitimate teacher. When they are hired, teachers are often sent to random places all over the country (hey...kind of like volunteers) where they do not speak the local language, or have any friends/family. In my training site, there was a teacher who had been living there for ten years and still had not learned sereer, had not made any friends in a community she did not consider "home" and basically just beat the kids all day long. However, the teachers at the english camp were amazing, They all spoke english very well, were funny, intelligent, motivated, and genuinely helpful. If there were more people like that, this country would be a very different place. Don't get me wrong, I love Senegal, but we can all surely agree there are problems. Hence why I am here.

Anyways, the kids were amazing as well. Super friendly, motivated, and a LOT of fun to be around. I definetly got more work done this week than I would have at site, and had a lot of fun doing it. I hope I can come back to the same school next year! We all gave our phone numbers to the kids in case they want to call and practice english, and here is an example text message that I got from one of my favorite girls yesterday:

"Hi Sarah how are you going? I am very happy to know you but love you very much. Ok I miss you a lot, I wish to spend the rest of my life by you, see you next year. kiss, aissatou."

On another note, today we drove past the airport and it was the first time I'd seen it since that morning 5 months ago when we stepped off the plane at 5am into a wall of humidity and salty ocean air. It's a surreal experience to see it now, especially knowing that in about forty-eight hours a whole new group of volunteers will be doing the exact same thing. We're getting sixty some new people on Wednesday, and a group of volunteers who have completed their service are heading out. Soon, I will no longer be one of the new kids in town, which is going to feel pretty nice. Anyways, in case anyone from the new stage is doing what I did before leaving, and reading blogs of people in country...I have two quick pieces of advice. One is to bring a Bedazzler if you can manage it. I can't say exactly why, except that you wont regret it and it will inevitably make everything that much better. And Two...good luck and safe travels. Thies is a magical sunny flowery place that you may or may not appreciate until after you have left for site.

That's all! I am going back to the land of no internet, electricity, etc. so I hope you all have a great month. It's kind of like camping, really. I miss and love everyone a WHOLE lot. Peace only, Jam Som, Jam Tan, Alhamdoulilahi.

Ladies and Gentlemen I am happy to announce that I have become the proud mother of a food baby, which I have named Beignet. I swear Ive gained at least 10 pounds in the past 2 weeks, and am even getting the characteristic Sprague Chin. But, I have to stock up while Im in cities. My village diet of rice and fish only is, by default, an effective weight loss plan of its own. For the past two weeks I have been in Thies where mass amounts of cheap fast food abound. The other night, we all went out in the pouring rain, and sat down at a restaurant. One of my friends and I, the other Sarah, actually, shared a giant Croque Madame, a Massive burger with fries ON it, along with eggs, mayonnaise, cheese, two hamburger patties, etc., two beers, and then finished it all off with an enormous cream filled doughnut. mmmmm. This has become a daily routine, and now I am in Dakar living on an additional, and quite generous, daily allowance, which means even more food. Just for "the glory of Dakar" reference, here is a picture from a Volunteer's balcony in Dakar (only 3rd year extension volunteers get nice apartments in Dakar).

Anyways, after gorging on the doughnut, we went swimming in the restaurant pool in the pouring rain. After swimming, we had to get to the tailor and then back to the center. Rain here means flooded streets, muddy rivers filled with horse and cow manure, as well as upwelling open sewers. Hello Schistosomiasis. While navigating our way through the flood, one of the other volunteers took a blind step into the muddy water, and literally fell up past her waist into a hole. Yuck.

On another note, the other afternoon was one of the best days of my life! I not only took a trip to get some beekeeping training, but also got a ride with another volunteer in the back of a strange little car that looked like a bread truck and did not shut all the way, to check out an aquaculture site. Here are some pictures from the whole day!

These are beehives tucked away in the forest:

And here is a big round of beeswax, which is left over after processing and used to attract bees to new hives. Also, you might notice that I have a haircut. One of the other volunteers cut it around midnight the other day with a pair of scissors in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other. You can't tell here...but its possibly the best haircut Ive ever had!

Anyways, here is another picture from the beekeeping site. I have NO idea what this building actually is, but it looks like the imperial command center on Endor.

Lastly, the aquaculture site was made from an enhanced natural basin, and is used for both fish production and community agriculture.

One last thing, here is a thunderstorm on its way to my site : )

Today I was torturing myself by watching Top Chef and fantasizing about all of the wonderful food...when I realized that my toe hurt a little bit. I looked down and saw that it was swollen with a small black spot in the middle. Thinking I had a splinter, I set in to digging it out. After some maneuvering, I pulled out a half inch long thorn that had been lodged completely into my toe. I didn't even feel it happen, and have no idea how long it was in there for. Thank you, Africa.

Once again, Im not sure what to write about. A quick logistic update: I am currently at the training center where we all have training sessions every day for the next two weeks. At night, we stay with host families in an hour radius. After two months of doing little to nothing…it’s kind of overwhelming, but also exciting. Training finishes on August 31st, when I will be traveling to Dakar to work at an English camp for one week.

I realized this week, through our technical sessions and talking with other volunteers as well as my supervisors, that it is time to get to work. I have spent the past 4 months focusing on having fun, appreciating the newness of this experience, arranging my environment so that I can be happy here, getting to know other volunteers, and getting familiar with my site. It has been fun, but Im starting to realize that Im here for a reason and will probably be a lot happier if I feel productive : ) Plus, being in village, there is just not enough else going on in my life to stay entertained. When I return to village on August 8th, I will have four days before Ramadan starts. Ramadan is a muslim holiday where people fast from sunup to sun down for one month. As you can probably imagine, its insanely hot here, and without any water or food…everyone will be too tired to do anything. My plan is to stay at site for at least the entirety of August, fasting along with my family (though I will be drinking water because I don’t want to die) hanging out, reading, and maybe applying for some grants. I hope that the time spent there will solidify my place in the community and help me to feel more comfortable there.

After Ramadan, I have quite a few project ideas. I am hoping to start a small micro financing project raising chickens. My village has attempted to do it before, but lacked a sense of economic planning. They sold off ALL of the chickens (thus shutting down the possibility of continuing the operation) when chickens were at their lowest market value.

I am also planning on working on a demo compound vegetable garden, so that families will use some of the extra space in their compounds to grow vegetables. Im going to see which families might be interested, and once it is established, will be able to lead training sessions.

Next week, I will start beekeeping training! It is only for one afternoon, but the training site is only an hour away from my village, so after I make contacts, I hope I will be able to go back and keep learning if I need to.

Once school starts up again in October, Im planning on working with some girls’ groups to start an environmental club, leadership sessions, and maybe a Harry Potter reading group just to help with literacy and imagination. And…because I like Harry Potter.

The last thing I know I want to try and do is to get my village connected to the water tower so that people can have robinets. That would mean safe drinking water and women will have more time to enjoy themselves, rather than pulling water from the well all day long. This is what I have been approached about the most, and what everyone is most excited about at the moment.

And, last thing, I know this isn’t professional, but since this is how I am keeping in touch with everyone…I would like you all to know that I am swearing off boys for at least three months. I think taking a break and focusing on other things would be a healthy idea.

Okay! I love you all. Hope things are going well! I need updates : )

I spent this past week travelling around the country and getting the chance to see other regions, houses, and a LOT of amazing people who I have missed over the past month! The whole purpose of the trip was to work at a girls' leadership camp, have language training, and celebrate the 4th of July, which I did along with a small group of people on the roof of a house in Kolda. We opened bottles of champagne, played taboo, and made a fried chicken and mashed potatoes dinner with apple pie for dessert. It was a lot of fun, and Kolda is gorgeous!

I forgot my camera while traveling, though, so, I am just going to ignore that whole time and instead do a quick photo narrative of possibly the most ridiculous night of my entire life. It was about two weeks ago, when Morgan (another volunteer who is a sarcastic and hilarious rugby player from Harvard, grew up in Alaska, and has a cat named Toubab), Jenny (also another volunteer who used to be a night security guard in DC who lived out of her car, carries around toads to scare people, and weightlifted regularly back home) and I met up in Jenny’s village for language training with Assane, our teacher from the training center.

Morgan journals on her computer, and recorded the experience right after it happened. So. I am going to tell it in her words along with my pictures, ie third person, with some additions and deletions on my part. Please try to enjoy how ridiculous it is that this is my life:

OMG we just had the funniest night experience ever. Dinner was the first part. They gave us millet and fish and also millet and milk. But Sarah and I dont like the normal milk (the tuberculosis milk) so we made powdered milk that tasted like coconut milk. It was awesome. (quote from Sarah: “DO YOU WANT SOME OF THIS MILK BEFORE IT ALL SOAKS IN?? JESUS” - she was mad cause I was taking too long to make the hole in my millet to pour the milk into. We laugh now, but at the time she was legit going to kill me. She didn’t even realize she said it, she’s just obsessed with food. Then assane mixed the milk with the millet and fish. It was disgusting. Here is a photo. You eat it with your hands by the way.

So then, as we are eating our instant milk powder and millet on the floor by headlamp and flashlight, a camel spider runs across the mat. I had never seen one before getting here...they are basically a spider and scorpion smooshed together, but are completely harmless. So naturally we all shrieked and I spilled milk all over the floor and we all leaped to the nearest elevated surface that we could find. (in doing so I obviously broke jennies cot), while assane grabbed the “fly swatter” which is actually a flip flop duct-taped to a stick, and nonchalantly killed the thing before going right back to eating the nar-nar fish millet milk. Here’s a picture of it:

This is what happened to the bowl after we all freaked out. My spoon fell in >: (

At this point Jennie left for unknown reasons, and Sarah and I resumed our eating of the millet and milk but we were afraid to sit on the floor cause of spiders so I felt the need to squat over the bowl while dribbling milk all over the place:

After this, I was going to take a picture of sarah over the bowl to show what we eat here. But, right as she leaned her head in to pose, jennie’s family came in. So I didnt take the picture. Sarah's head was in the bowl, so she had no idea they were all staring at her. I sat there trying to find the words in english to warn Sarah that there were people looking, but I couldn’t, so she sat there totally oblivious with her headlamp on and her face approx 1 inch above the millet while laughing hysterically for a good minute. I was whisper shouting the only words that came to mind, “peeeeoople, sarah, there are peeeoooople...” which she obviously did not pick up on. After a moment or so, Jenny’s family slowly backed their way out of the hut. Here is the photo that resulted:

So, that happened and then Jennie burst back into the room, bright red and bawling her eyes out. Her ENTIRE family followed her in, obviously bewhildered and trying to figure out WHAT was wrong, and why their toubab was crying. Apparently Jenny is afraid of camel spiders. They had no idea what was going on, though. Here they are:

In the midst of the chaos they were like “OMG why is jennie crying??” to which I accidentally responded, in broken Sereer, “Jenny Died...” thinking that they had asked what happened to the spider and unaware that they hadnt yet figured out the situation or the existence (or.. former existence) of said spider. Which caused further confusion. At which point I escaped to pee and returned to find Sarah sitting on the bed taking pictures and looking completely non-plussed by and oblivious to the approximately 10 senegalese people all trying to figure out why Jennie was crying. Mostly, Sarah was sad that they had put the lid back on the bowl. (they did put the lid back on the bowl. I was very unhappy about that).

Finally we managed to get rid of the senegalese people (after they kept trying to get jennie to put her shoes on. Like that was going to make it better. Or flipflops were going to keep the spider off her feet. Sigh) briefly. And we resumed eating. Until, in a burst of laughter over jenny crying, assane disappearing, my squatting over the bowl, and the whole situation, sarah snotted in the millet (yes. Booger. DRIPPED out of her nose. Disgusting. +1 for sarah) and we gave up trying to eat. Forgetting, of course, that someone will later be eating this snotty bowl of millet. Oops. Then some of jennies family came back to take the bowl and we topped off an evening of miscommunication with the following exchange:

Sarah: what was that running thing?

Jennies mom: [something that sounded like “horse scorpion” in seereer]

Sarah: what does it eat? [at least thats what we thought she said]

Jennie's mom: WHAT?? assane ATE it?? the spider??

Sarah: uhhh.. no.... ummmm....

And once again...they slowly backed their way out of the hut, but this time did not come back.

At this point we realized the cot was broken, so we broke out a hammer and all struggled to fix it. Fail:

And. That was language training. Here is Jenny with a frog:

I understand if you’re terrified, the rest of the village is too! : )

I will be putting up new photos soon! Im in the middle of traveling, but thought I would give a quick conclusion to the mouse trap debacle.

The trap was all set up and ready to go for the night, but, a very strange thing happened. I was awoken around 5am by a large PLOP and the sound of scurrying. I turned on my headlamp and peered through the mosquito net to see something flopping around on the floor. My first thought was that I had a confused toad on my hands, but I then realized that it was the mouse. It fell off the ceiling and landed, literally, right next to the mouse trap. It was injured from the fall, and understandably freaking out, and I had no idea what to do. I got up and basically just stared at it in shock for a good 10 minutes while my brain struggled to function. I didn't want to touch it, and had absolutely nothing to pick it up with/put it in (i mean, come on, its not like im in America where things are available). I eventually dumped out my hamper and swept the mouse into it. I tried to throw it over the fence, but...missed. It landed in my compost pile, and I gave up. I sluggishly made my way back to bed, hoping that something would eat it while I slept so I wouldnt have to deal with it in the morning. It was gone the next day. Problem solved.

: )

I am so excited for this week! I am traveling to another part of the country for the 4th of July. Last year I climbed up a volcano in Hawaii with a bunch of Canadians for the 4th. We'll see what this year brings!

Sometimes, when I am sitting around doing a whole lot of nothing (erm...i mean, working hard and saving the world) I come up with brilliant things to write here in the blog. However, once all of the magic ingredients have coalesced to make internet time possible, I am inevitably sitting somewhere cool, pleasant, possibly beachside, and with electricity. Add that to the fact that my bi-weekly beer is probably in one hand, causing me to slowly tap out one letter at a time due to my extreme reluctance to let go of it for even a second, and you have the perfect recipe for stream-of consciousness blog posts. My immersion in paradise generates a complete and utter indifference towards what seemed important one or two days ago : ) So, I uploaded pictures and will take this opportunity to tell you about my room mates. Just take it in confidence that I have lots of exciting projects and plans at site going full speed ahead.

So, as far as I can tell, my bug nerdiness began during summers in North Carolina which were defined by days spent staring at caddisfly larvae in mountain streams, catching june bugs by the dozen, and killing jarfulls of fireflies under the pretense of "making lanterns." As I mentioned earlier, though, my bug love is being put to the test here. However! Look who came flying into my hut the other night, causing me to bolt into the backyard yelping in fright. Eventually, I tiptoed my way back in to investigate. I poked and prodded the creature to asses the potential dangers, at which point I discovered...its a praying mantis!!! So, I picked it up and took photos:

Mantids eat obnoxious bugs like flies, mosquitoes, and beetles, so they are fine by me. Plus, they are fascinating creatures. I caught one a couple of weeks ago and named her Jaws, but she isn't an adult yet, so no idea what species she is. Here's a photo:

Now. I also have about 5 or 6 geckos living in the hut. In case you are picturing the cute little terrarium inhabiting creatures...that's not the case. Look at this monster:

He thinks he's hiding in this picture (?). Like mantids, Geckos also eat the obnoxious bugs, and are thus welcome in my humble abode. This fellow has also recently moved into my hut:

He, also, seems to think he is hiding in this picture (nobody ever said being cute=having brains). My attitude towards him was benevolent, up until about two days ago. Besides his affinity for eating my erasers, I didn't see the problem with having a mouse. That is, until I lay awake the other night pondering what I could do to get rid of the beetles who have recently taken to boring holes in the wooden beams holding up my roof (more geckos? more mantids? Insecticide?). I considered the finely balanced food web in this here hut. The beetles eat my hut, the Geckos eat the beetles. The mosquitoes eat me, the geckos eat the mosquitoes. I would like to get a cat for a pet, but then it would eat the geckos, and I need those for population control. But what about the mouse? Where does it fit in....really? Well! let me tell you...after some investigation I realized that the mouse is ALSO eating my hut!!! The thatch roofing. Apparently the all-eraser diet needs supplementing. My hut is under attack on two fronts, and I decided not to sit back and watch it crumble to the ground. I came up with a "roommate management plan." Here it is:

My very own mouse trap, baited with an eraser. The idea is simple, the evil hut-eating noise-making mouse walks up the ramp, steps onto the can to get the eraser, the can flips under the weight, and the mouse is dumped into a bucket of unfiltered well water. mwahaha. And then I can, inchallah, get a good night's sleep for once, while the hut eating shenanigans are put to a watery end. We'll see what happens. I would prefer a less violent method, but the thought of not only catching a live mouse, but then walking through the village with it and trying to explain what I'm doing just seems like too much of an ordeal.

In other, less morbid news, here are some family photos. There are two year old twins in my family who are super cute. They like to have me throw shirts over their heads so they can dance around like that. Again...being cute does not equal big brains. Also witnessed by my four year old brother who was, yesterday, dancing around with a plastic bag on his head and shoes on the wrong feet. I didn't take a picture of that. It seemed a bit...cruel. Im glad to report that he is perfectly fine, though.

OK! Have a good day.

I realize that I am in Africa, but it feels like I just took all of the best parts of my life back home (except family of course) and threw them together in a fun new environment. I caught an awesome praying mantis and have been catching bugs for it to eat, gardening, planning exciting projects, speaking french, playing with kids, and at the end of this month will be lifeguarding for an all-girls leadership camp that a bunch of volunteers are putting on! Just a quick overview, this is what the next couple of months look like:

June3-6: Wrestling tournament at a friend's site

June6-? Hang out at site, get work done, get ready for rainy season!

June23-26th: Lifeguard/first aid at camp

June 27-29th: Language training at another volunteer's site

June 29-July 4ish: Travel to Kedougou for 4th of July party

Mid July-August: Back to the training center for IST

Somewhere in there I am determined to get beekeeping training so I can get it all set up and maybe attract my own hive of happy little honeybees by the end of the rainy season. We'll see!

Well! 10 days down...only like 700+ left to go : ) I have spent almost two weeks at site, with absolutely no English or other white people or technology of any kind, and it went surprisingly well! I go back and forth between extreme excitement, total contentment, bewhilderment in regards to what I am doing here, and complete motivation to actually accomplish something. The other day as I set into hacking apart the rock hard ground in my backyard in order to make a garden, it occurred to me that I have absolutely no real-life worries, I can listen to music, make my own schedule, play in the dirt, and collect bugs whenever I please. I get to make mudstoves, read all day, eat infinite mangoes and play with kids. It’s….fantastic in a very uneventful way : )

But generally, I am just trying to get to know everyone in the village, start up some slow projects, and figure out how to get through daily life of greeting everyone, pulling water, surviving the heat, etc. Today is my first “day off.” I came into Mbour with another volunteer, and we’re having a “ten days at site” sleepover party in my backyard! There is absolutely nothing in the entire world that can make you appreciate a cold beer and day at the beach like spending a week in a very hot and very small West African village.

Anyways, I have pictures. These are before and after pictures of my hut (inside and outside). As you may notice…I painted it like Bag End. You know, Bilbo’s house. The funny thing is, everyone here just keeps saying how pretty is and how much they like it, and are asking me to paint their houses the same. So, I drew the same thing on my younger mom’s room, and my sisters went at it with the paints. Heh heh heh. I know it makes me a nerd…but nobody here knows that, so it’s fine : ) Just remember, if sometime in the future you are driving through Senegal and you come across a random village painted entirely like Middle Earth…that’s where I was!

Oh, also, one quick story, the other day I was hanging out with my favorite woman in the village (who, it turns out, is actually from Dakar and leaving soon, much to my chagrin) when I happened to look over right as a little kid picked up a half smoldering manure cake from the fire pit, shoved it into his mouth, and burst out crying. Nobody did anything about that...then moments later a chicken wandered into the same fire pit, and immediately flipped out and bolted away squawking. Then a goat did the same thing, also to no reaction from anyone. Who needs TV anyways?

My Hut, BEFORE:

And After!! : )

Hut Inside, Before:

Hut inside, After!

Mud Stove!

OOK. Thank you for reading, I send you all love and hugs and kisses from Senegal!