Silly Shenanigans in Senegal

Monday, April 19, 2010

Hut Sweet Hut!

So I finally meet my permanent Senegalese family (the family I will live with for 2 years). They gave my a new name, so now my name is Jeneba Sabaly! To get to Thiewal Lao (my new home) I had to drive across Senegal in a Peace Corps car, which involved waiting in the 100 plus degree heat for 5 hours while we waited to cross the Gambia River. The fastest way to the Kolda Region (where Thiewal Lao is located) requires crossing the Gambia...a ridiculous nonsensical tiny country in the middle of Senegal. The current volunteers promised us the best chicken sandwiches ever when we were in the Ferry waiting line...they lied, which broke our hearts. Traveling across Senegal also requires traveling on the most ridiculously bumpy paved and unpaved roads...roads which are also seriously lacking in law enforcement. In a Peace Corps car the ride isn't terrible but for most of my trips from now on I will be in the back of an ancient station wagon known here as a sept-place (7 seats). Also, on the way back to the Peace Corps Training Center (a 10 hour drive in the fast Peace Corps car), there were 10 people plus a dog in our toyota SUV which confortably fits 5 people. And I don't mean a Schnitzel sized dog...I mean a thirty-forty pound dog...awesome! Also our air conditioner broke...apparently a situation like that still beats a sept place ride, I'll let you know once I have that experience.
Once I got to my site I met my nearest white person/peace corp vol neighbor (6k from me through the bush). She has a Senegalese dog named Nacho and I spent my 5 days in Kolda living in her village while visiting surrounding villages. Aside from literally reaching 120 degrees in the middle of the day, there is also a constant buzzing in your ears whenever you are in Kolda...due to the evil flies. There are also bugs everywhere and apprently it will only get way worse when rainy season starts. We saw a dead scorpion while strolling through the woods searching for cashew apples and mangoes to pick and eat off the trees...it was gross. Also saw some rather intimidating spiders and learned that having bats and lizards in your room is commonplace. One volunteer even had a snake in her room...but that is abnormal, so are scorpions...hopefully. On the other hand, there are much nicer animals all over the place...including the roosters that seem a little confused about when dawn actually occurs. Cows just wander around along with goats, sheep, etc. I even carried a little baby goat. everyone sleeps outside here and Amanda (my nearest neighbor) said she used to wake up with a cow ten inches from her face on a regular basis. Many other things impede your sleeping...like the goats which sound like yelling children all night and the sheep which sound like drunken freshmen all night long. Also the mosque seems to feel that chanting all night is a neccessity. Even the cows make awful noises after one of the cows is killed. Its crazy...luckily I sleep like a rock.
While in village I also ate bush rabbit, freshly killed by amanda's dog, Nacho. Bush rabbit is vile...I had to hold my hand over my mouth to avoid choking the meat back into the bowl...yum. Otherwise the food in village (peanut butter or leaf sauce over rice) was delicious! Even the village water is good. I am supposed to only drink filtered water but when you run out of filtered water and are traveling you kind of have to drink straight well water. I have now had unfiltered well water in 3 villages and I'm still alive!
To get food like bread or coffee I have to bike 18k along a bush path to my road town (Dabo). Luckily I have an amazing brand new bike! My road town has a weekly market where I can get any of the Senegalese things I may be craving...like bissap juice/ice bags...basically a sandwich big filled with frozen bissap juice or any of a variety of yummy Senegalese juices. I can get coffee and a bean or egg sandwich any day of the week in my road town. Also, another volunteer lives in the town and he has electricity!
While in village I also had to practice my Senegaleseness and greet EVERYONE...not only everyone in my village but also everyone in the next door village. In the space of 2 days I figure I shook hands with somewhere between 500-1000 people. I visited each families compound, sat down for about 2 minutes awkwardly then moved on. The sitting down is apparently a very important component of the greeting. I was allowed to hold a baby that was less than one day old! On that note...a week or two ago some people started speaking to me in Woloof (I didn't understand a word) but I somehow agreed to go visit their house. So I followed them around town (at this point i didn't even know where I was going) and into their house, at which point I had to sit down of course. The two women proceeded to hand me both of their children, I think 4 and 5 months old. We do not share a common language at all and I had no idea who these two women were. I sat there for about 10 minutes and finally just stood up handed the babies back and left...even now i don't know who they were or why that happened...hilarious.
Anyway back to the village visit...my new Senegalese mom (one of 3) reminds me of Lynne Hathaway...which is interesting. I have now reached such a state of horselessness that while biking the other day I heard I sound coming from behind be...I though one of the bikes had a flat tire...turns out it was a cantering horse...

Also, i decided that the well pump in my training village was placed their by coach Kish...for a pump it is distrubingly like rowing...and its also ridiculously hard to use. I get the pleasure of using this pump everyday.

Sorry for the long update...lots happened in the past few days, hope that all made sense!

peace out girl/boy scouts

Monday, April 12, 2010

How to Cure Eczema While Watching Polar Express

While gardening yesterday the school gardener informed Peace Corps Volunteer Wilma that he knew how to cure her eczema. Simply place detergent, salt, and water in a bucket...wash skin 3x. Eczema cured. Wilma still has eczema today...she must not be able to find on of the ingredients :)
Also yesterday...while sweating my eyes of in the 95 degree heat I went into the "living room" to see what the fam was watching...they were watching Polar Express...for serious. It was ridiculous!
One of our language teachers who speaks something like 5 languages fluently was telling us about someone's age the other day and he was speaking English (probably the 5th language he learned). He speaks English very well but informed us that someone's host mom was "Kind of 25" which was quite amusing. It really just makes me feel better about all of the awkward phrases I will be saying over the next 2 years.
I will try to upload pictures sometime in the near future! I haven't taken many yet because whipping out you camera only leads to constant requests for Senegalese photo shoots but I will man up!
Also, I probably will forget to respond to blog comments but I read them and love them! If you want me to respond send me an email and I promise I will answer (not quickly but eventually).
Ciao!

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Thank Peace Corps Volunteer Wilma for Figuring Out How to Post This

Lots of stuff to tell! First some random funny things that are everywhere in Senegal and amuse me…

- Akon…they LOVE him, mostly because he’s from Senegal! Unfortunately he speaks Seerer, not Fulakunda like me so I can’t communicate with Akon in Senegalese L

- Family Matters – yes…I watch Family Matters, dubbed in French, with my Senegalese family

- Marriage Proposals – every Peace Corps volunteer gets proposed to on a regular basis, possibly because we’re so attractive but maybe its really cause everyone wants to get to America

- Awesome Clothes – my love for crazy colorful clothing has an outlet! Everyone here has awesome beautiful crazy colored clothes. Including me, since I just had a traditional Senegalese outfit made. Bright green skirt with a multi-colored polka dot shirt J

- Yummy Food (pretty much anything lacking in Fish – which can be slightly hard to find) – the Mom of one of the volunteers sells benyays and coffee, hot fresh sugary and delicious! The coffee here is yummaliscious. We can also get lots of delic fruit and some other crazy foods, like peanut butter oatmeal (as named by me) We also get ice cream whenever we can lay our hands on it and had some Senegalese burgers the other day. Sounds sketchy right? They were AMAZING! Eggs, cheese, fries, a burger, ketchup, all on a roll…yum. And then after that I returned home to find that my Mom had of course saved me lunch which clearly I had to eat( fish L ) only to find out that about 2 hours later I was to be served my fav Senegalese meal, fishless salad (which means I have to stuff my face unashamedly to make sure they understand its my fav). I then laid on the floor for several hours digesting. Yes, I know my standards of amazing cuisine have clearly droppped.

- Little Children screaming toubab – Toubab is basically the word for white person, when white people walk around in Senegal they are constantly accompanied by a hoard of under-10 year olds screaming toubab and trying to touch you…now I know what Akon feels like. While watering our garden one day one of the volunteers decided to dance with the kids, after which I had to run dancing out of the garden to get them away from our poor trampled plants. This resulted in a hoard of 100 plus kids hoarding around us begging us to dance and all trying to talk to us and touch us. We had to hide in someone’s house while some adults cleared the riot. CRAZY.

- American music – even better when my Senegalese brother who speaks no English sings along to Beyonce

- Show Jumping on TV – I got so excited I think my Senegalese Mom was worried. I was like HORSES!!! JUMPING!!!!

- Braids – it was pretty much mandatory that my hair be braided for the 50th Celebration of Senegalese Independence Day…so I could fit in!

- Mud Stoves – we build stoves out of mud and donkey poo…apparently they are more efficient than many of the Senegalese stoves

- Murals – we painted a mural in the health center…FAIL…painting murals is REALLY hard. There were back injuries involved.

- Babies – my neighbor’s newborn was named Fatou, after me! So exciting. One volunteer had a baby named after his American name…so I’m aspiring to that.

- Beach Resorts! – my training site is a 25 minute walk from a resort…and one volunteer works there so volunteers are allowed to go hang out there and sit on the beach/swim in the ocean/drink pineapple vanilla floats/eat curry chicken…on our infrequent days off.

- Kids with ridiculously high pain tolerance – the braids are pretty much ripped out of the kids heads, it took me 2 hours to gently remove the braids that my mom can pull out in 10 minutes. But the kids don’t even flinch. We had to cut the earrings to get them out of my 5 year old sister’s ears because her ears we so infected…an American child would have been screaming his or her eyes out and would need a parent to sit on them, Koumba didn’t move an inch or make a sound.

- American Clothes – ever wonder where your used clothes go? Senegal. Want Proof? I finally met another PA volunteer (there are no PA people in training with me) and she went to CB West/East, I can’t remember. But she was out in the wilderness and passed someone wearing a North Penn Knights (yes, as in Lansdale, PA) Championship T-Shirt.

- Kittens – I already patially adopted one because people here are afraid of cats, thus they kick sand at little baby kittens that should still be with their Mommas, and I clearly needed to save every kitten in this condition. I’ll try not to get ringworm.

Finally, my most exciting news! I know where I will be living for the next 2 years! A village called Thiewal Lao in the Kolda region of Senegal. That is in the South (lots of good fruit, very hot – I’ve heard as high as 130F, skin diseases galore). The volunteer that just left built a health post so I have a lot to live up to! Peace Corps tells us where our permanent site is by blind folding us and placing us on giant map of Senegal and then we all open our eyes and see our new sites and what volunteers are near us. It was so crazy exciting!

If you read this whole post I’m impressed…I wasn’t even brave enough to proof read it. I miss everyone mucho mucho mucho!

PS – I’m feeling a bit sad about the McNabblessness