It feels like every day I’m here I get farther away from a clear picture of what I want to do when I grow up. Like I’m in a tunnel, but instead of moving forward, I’m being pulled backward and the light at the end is getting smaller and smaller. In my mind, this light is a clear representation of exactly who I will be, what I will do, and where I will live. Truthfully, I’ve never really known with absolute certainty what I want. I envy my friends with conviction; director, lawyer, pilot. I dread the job interview question asking where I see myself in 5 or 10 years. If you asked me today what I want to do at the end of my PC service, the only sure thing I could tell you is “be happy.”
I know I talked a while back about joining the Foreign Service, hell I took the test, but then I started to reconsider. For starters, it would derail the next few months of my service. Writing entrance essays, preparing for upcoming testing phases, finding the means to get to DC for said phases… I see this being very distracting. I truly want to be an excellent volunteer; to make a difference. And deep down, I know that won’t be possible if I’m distracted by the next phase of my life approaching so quickly and demanding such focus and attentiveness. So I started to think I should’ve waited until next year to take the test. I don’t know if I’m unlucky or lucky, if it’s fate or just chance… but I didn’t score high enough to pass the Foreign Service test.
And then this spiraled out of control. I got to thinking; yes, I do want to spend a good portion of my life as an expat. But I’ve been lazy about it. I find the prepackaged ways of going about it: study abroad where they arrange school and housing; Peace Corps that assigns you a job and a country. I find the options where I already have a reason to get a visa, already have a place to stay worked out, as well as something to do. Isn’t the whole point of being a world traveler the adventure in roaming about doing your own thing and experiencing the unknown? Why then am I being so careful, so lazy, so cookie cutter about it? I shouldn’t get a job with the State Department where they organize jobs, countries, and housing. I should pick a place and go. Figure things out for myself.
So then what? Where? I’ve considered moving to France to work on my language. Should I learn another language? I might be getting the hang of it. I’ve considered various locations throughout the US. I could stay in Africa. Then again there are 2 continents I’ve yet to touch down on. I could live in a big city and use public transportation. I could find a quiet little town and make a difference. I’ve thought about jobs in writing, marketing or purchasing. Can I get job as a professional planner? I think I’m good at that (current topic excluded). Charles thinks I’d make a great VP in his future company. Is it possible to do it all? For the first time in a while, possibly ever, I feel like I can honestly do anything. There are so many paths opening up in front of me. Can I move to a bubble on the moon?
So one thing is clear, I can’t answer this question today. There’s a chance that “when I grow up” may never come to pass. I could very well be one of those people who never knows what the future brings, but I’ll be damned if I don’t have a really great story about something that’s happened in my past. I will be a child of the world. I will be happy.
Sunday, August 1
Wednesday, July 28
Charles' View
I’ve made a new friend. His name is Charles. He’s Senegalese born, grew up in Paris, studied and worked in the US, and now lives in Canada. Or should I say lived? He’s currently working for the Canadian government on a project I don’t fully understand, but somehow equates to the Canadian version of USAID. He’s been assigned to Mboro for the next 5 months.
I met Charles by chance. I had originally tried to work with the women’s groups of Mboro… but was blown off because of my initially oh-so-poor language skills. The top women in the cooperative of groups don’t speak French and I can barely pass introductory Wolof. As it happens, a few weeks back I saw one of the women sitting in the street and was invited to pass by their offices to say hello. A week or two later, I did so on my way to something else. They told me about their operations, their biggest problem being sales, and an open house they were thinking about hosting. I mentioned that I was organizing Marketing classes and we agreed I should find a way to teach the women as well. In the mean time, with the pending open house, I would show them some examples of basic marketing they could use during the event. I made a draft promotional flyer and went back the next week to show them. They introduced me to Charles.
He too was trying to demonstrate all the potential the pending event could bring to the women’s sales. We spend the rest of the day talking, exchanging marketing ideas, etc. I told him I would gladly join in on this quest to revamp the women’s products in order to capture sales both in Mboro and new markets. In his 5 months, we wants to teach to teach the women about quality control, redo packaging and labeling, and install a marketing and sales plan. This is not his only project in town. Maybe I’ve been here too long, but it seems like he’s got a lot on his plate and a short amount of time to accomplish it. On the other hand, maybe I’ve become too complacent with the Senegalese pace of life and have therefore resigned myself to a lack luster dance card of possibilities. Hmm.
In the later part of our initial, yet day long, encounter, Charles started to voice his opinions about the way the Senegalese handle their affairs. This made me smile. Here I was with a Senegalese man who had more complaints than I about his own country. He’d only been in Mboro a short time, but was already frustrated with meetings that didn’t start on time and weren’t even productive when they did start. He’s annoyed by the politics and the lack of initiative to get things done.
Another day I explained to Charles that Mboro was a pretty lucky place to be assigned. I described the typical village-life Peace Corps service and he absolutely could not believe it. He couldn’t do it. He’d worked so hard to get where he has, he can’t imagine going back. As he spent the whole of his Senegalese life in Dakar, I suppose he’s saying he has no idea how he would adjust to village life. It is quite different from the world of Dakar. As it stands, however, Charles is like any other Westerner. He takes anti-malarial prophylaxis and can’t drink the tap water without getting sick. I told him I expected this life, had asked for it.
In the short time I’ve known him, Charles has amused me. He is contradictory to all I know about Senegal… perhaps I need to think of him as child of the world instead of just one place. He has gotten me to rethink that with which I’ve become complacent, and I find a bit of my American self coming back around. Today, I made a ‘to do’ list and assigned everything a deadline. These are things I can do by a specific day. I’ve forgotten I have that capability; to commit to myself. Or maybe I needed someone else alongside me, maybe I made a ‘to do’ list of things I’m doing for “our” project. I suppose the best thing about Charles is that he is my new colleague; my coworker.
And so in honor of Charles, I leave you to join him at the boutique for an after work beer. Look, happy hour is back too!
I met Charles by chance. I had originally tried to work with the women’s groups of Mboro… but was blown off because of my initially oh-so-poor language skills. The top women in the cooperative of groups don’t speak French and I can barely pass introductory Wolof. As it happens, a few weeks back I saw one of the women sitting in the street and was invited to pass by their offices to say hello. A week or two later, I did so on my way to something else. They told me about their operations, their biggest problem being sales, and an open house they were thinking about hosting. I mentioned that I was organizing Marketing classes and we agreed I should find a way to teach the women as well. In the mean time, with the pending open house, I would show them some examples of basic marketing they could use during the event. I made a draft promotional flyer and went back the next week to show them. They introduced me to Charles.
He too was trying to demonstrate all the potential the pending event could bring to the women’s sales. We spend the rest of the day talking, exchanging marketing ideas, etc. I told him I would gladly join in on this quest to revamp the women’s products in order to capture sales both in Mboro and new markets. In his 5 months, we wants to teach to teach the women about quality control, redo packaging and labeling, and install a marketing and sales plan. This is not his only project in town. Maybe I’ve been here too long, but it seems like he’s got a lot on his plate and a short amount of time to accomplish it. On the other hand, maybe I’ve become too complacent with the Senegalese pace of life and have therefore resigned myself to a lack luster dance card of possibilities. Hmm.
In the later part of our initial, yet day long, encounter, Charles started to voice his opinions about the way the Senegalese handle their affairs. This made me smile. Here I was with a Senegalese man who had more complaints than I about his own country. He’d only been in Mboro a short time, but was already frustrated with meetings that didn’t start on time and weren’t even productive when they did start. He’s annoyed by the politics and the lack of initiative to get things done.
Another day I explained to Charles that Mboro was a pretty lucky place to be assigned. I described the typical village-life Peace Corps service and he absolutely could not believe it. He couldn’t do it. He’d worked so hard to get where he has, he can’t imagine going back. As he spent the whole of his Senegalese life in Dakar, I suppose he’s saying he has no idea how he would adjust to village life. It is quite different from the world of Dakar. As it stands, however, Charles is like any other Westerner. He takes anti-malarial prophylaxis and can’t drink the tap water without getting sick. I told him I expected this life, had asked for it.
In the short time I’ve known him, Charles has amused me. He is contradictory to all I know about Senegal… perhaps I need to think of him as child of the world instead of just one place. He has gotten me to rethink that with which I’ve become complacent, and I find a bit of my American self coming back around. Today, I made a ‘to do’ list and assigned everything a deadline. These are things I can do by a specific day. I’ve forgotten I have that capability; to commit to myself. Or maybe I needed someone else alongside me, maybe I made a ‘to do’ list of things I’m doing for “our” project. I suppose the best thing about Charles is that he is my new colleague; my coworker.
And so in honor of Charles, I leave you to join him at the boutique for an after work beer. Look, happy hour is back too!
Sunday, July 25
Upscale Flood
I don’t think I’ve ever stated this for the record, but I have a pretty patron African life. Of all the volunteers in Senegal, I’m fairly certain my humble abode of Mboro ranks top 5 for best site in terms of amenities and scenery. If you’ll permit me to explain a bit, without trying to brag, you'll find that even in African paradise things go wrong...
Most PCVs either don’t have electricity in their village or do but sporadically thanks to the lack of capacity to serve everyone. Mboro on the other hand, has an mining factory that generates its own power and distributes the leftovers to the town. I happen to live in a neighborhood build specifically for the families of factory management, which means that we get first dibs on that leftover energy. And as the factory operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, it can’t afford to ever lose power so it has a number of backup options. In my world, the power goes out and comes back 5 minutes later. At most it’s gone an hour; I’ve yet to see longer.
On top of that, what little power comes to the people of Senegal is very expensive and many a PCV has noted that host families are always asking for more money to help pay the bills. It can be so stressful volunteers will get their own meters so as to end the usage appropriations arguments. And again, I got lucky in that my neighborhood of managers does not have to pay for the power that comes from the factory. Can you say fringe benefits?
Here’s another one. Along with power, my neighborhood is supplied with water free of charge too. The real kicker is that it’s pretreated and preheated. I use my water filter for kicks, but I don’t really have to. In all honesty, it’s a means to let the water cool down before I drink it. With all this free water, my family has the ability to continuously water plants and we therefore have a back yard of fruit trees and flowers. My host mom has a passion for gardening, so we have an aesthetically beautiful landscape.
Outside of my neighborhood is the rest of my awesome town. Mboro is loaded with easily accessible fruits and veggies, and oh-so-close to the ocean with its lovely cool breezes. We are lucky to skip the average tourist’s radar… and are thus left to enjoy it all for ourselves. We have a mix of 3 different ethnic groups (meaning different languages, characters of people, styles of cooking, religions, etc) that add to just how great the people are. We are modern like Dakar but small enough to just barely be a formal town. We have stores with Western products because there's enough foreign traffic is brought in for the plant to warrant them. We have a night club and even a formal dining restaurant with white linens. And yet, for most of the year, there are only about 6 white people roaming around town… all of us speaking Wolof and blending in with the locals. I’m afraid to ask what Mboro means in Wolof, because I like to think it’s “oasis” and don’t want to be disappointed.
Now, before you starting thinking I’m living the highlife (and my fellow PCVs decide to hate me), know that it’s not all peachy keen. I still have mice and lizards as roommates. Ridiculous heat is hard to escape no matter how many breezes there are. And I still have daily clashes with African culture. The hot water is only really beneficial for about 2 months of the year when it’s cold in the mornings… the rest of the time it’s a bit odd to step into a hot shower in 100 degree weather. But the point of today’s blog is the problems specifically associated with my ‘upscale’ living.
I have a private western toilet and sink in my room, as well as the bidet-esque water gun on a hose used in the place of toilet paper. These are more signs of high end Africa. However, last week the handle on my water gun broke and I had to call in my handyman uncle to change out the contraption for a new one. He did this just as I was about to take off for a weekend in Dakar. Upon my return Monday morning, I learned that he had not correctly installed the new device and consequently flooded my entire bedroom. According to my host mom, she found the problem when water started leaking out from underneath my door, the edge of which is roughly a two inch step up from the floor of my room.
Mom says it took two days to clean up all the water off the floor (making me glad she has the spare key), and she’d made my brothers carry my Peace Corps books (stored under my bed) out into the sun and back each day to dry out. My hard drive was locked in my cupboard in my night stand, along with one of the kid computers that belongs to the school across the street, and I’m still afraid to turn either of them on as I swear they’re still wet inside. I’ve thrown out half the paper products that were in there due to mold that grew over the weekend.
A few days later, when I went to pull my Senegalese dress out from the bottom drawer of my dresser for a big event in town, I discovered that although the water didn’t reach up that high, it had spread through the wood dampening half my wardrobe. These items also decided to start a garden of mold. I spend the rest of the week and all of my free time rewashing my laundry by hand with extra soap and bleach.
But you know, I've no reason to complain. The flood sucked, was an experience, but only a minor set back. Lessons learned include: it’s a good thing to trust my host family with my spare key, asking for cleaning gloves was a genius move (go me!), double check all future work of my ‘handyman’ uncle, I’m not really all that phased about losing half my possessions in a flood (only thing I really care about is the hard drive), and if something’s really important I need to take it with me when I leave. There are clichés that apply too. More money, more problems. Upscale living has upscale problems- because a hut in the village doesn’t have enclosed flooring. You get what you pay for (free plumbing). And something about how spring cleaning is therapeutic.
Most PCVs either don’t have electricity in their village or do but sporadically thanks to the lack of capacity to serve everyone. Mboro on the other hand, has an mining factory that generates its own power and distributes the leftovers to the town. I happen to live in a neighborhood build specifically for the families of factory management, which means that we get first dibs on that leftover energy. And as the factory operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, it can’t afford to ever lose power so it has a number of backup options. In my world, the power goes out and comes back 5 minutes later. At most it’s gone an hour; I’ve yet to see longer.
On top of that, what little power comes to the people of Senegal is very expensive and many a PCV has noted that host families are always asking for more money to help pay the bills. It can be so stressful volunteers will get their own meters so as to end the usage appropriations arguments. And again, I got lucky in that my neighborhood of managers does not have to pay for the power that comes from the factory. Can you say fringe benefits?
Here’s another one. Along with power, my neighborhood is supplied with water free of charge too. The real kicker is that it’s pretreated and preheated. I use my water filter for kicks, but I don’t really have to. In all honesty, it’s a means to let the water cool down before I drink it. With all this free water, my family has the ability to continuously water plants and we therefore have a back yard of fruit trees and flowers. My host mom has a passion for gardening, so we have an aesthetically beautiful landscape.
Outside of my neighborhood is the rest of my awesome town. Mboro is loaded with easily accessible fruits and veggies, and oh-so-close to the ocean with its lovely cool breezes. We are lucky to skip the average tourist’s radar… and are thus left to enjoy it all for ourselves. We have a mix of 3 different ethnic groups (meaning different languages, characters of people, styles of cooking, religions, etc) that add to just how great the people are. We are modern like Dakar but small enough to just barely be a formal town. We have stores with Western products because there's enough foreign traffic is brought in for the plant to warrant them. We have a night club and even a formal dining restaurant with white linens. And yet, for most of the year, there are only about 6 white people roaming around town… all of us speaking Wolof and blending in with the locals. I’m afraid to ask what Mboro means in Wolof, because I like to think it’s “oasis” and don’t want to be disappointed.
Now, before you starting thinking I’m living the highlife (and my fellow PCVs decide to hate me), know that it’s not all peachy keen. I still have mice and lizards as roommates. Ridiculous heat is hard to escape no matter how many breezes there are. And I still have daily clashes with African culture. The hot water is only really beneficial for about 2 months of the year when it’s cold in the mornings… the rest of the time it’s a bit odd to step into a hot shower in 100 degree weather. But the point of today’s blog is the problems specifically associated with my ‘upscale’ living.
I have a private western toilet and sink in my room, as well as the bidet-esque water gun on a hose used in the place of toilet paper. These are more signs of high end Africa. However, last week the handle on my water gun broke and I had to call in my handyman uncle to change out the contraption for a new one. He did this just as I was about to take off for a weekend in Dakar. Upon my return Monday morning, I learned that he had not correctly installed the new device and consequently flooded my entire bedroom. According to my host mom, she found the problem when water started leaking out from underneath my door, the edge of which is roughly a two inch step up from the floor of my room.
Mom says it took two days to clean up all the water off the floor (making me glad she has the spare key), and she’d made my brothers carry my Peace Corps books (stored under my bed) out into the sun and back each day to dry out. My hard drive was locked in my cupboard in my night stand, along with one of the kid computers that belongs to the school across the street, and I’m still afraid to turn either of them on as I swear they’re still wet inside. I’ve thrown out half the paper products that were in there due to mold that grew over the weekend.
A few days later, when I went to pull my Senegalese dress out from the bottom drawer of my dresser for a big event in town, I discovered that although the water didn’t reach up that high, it had spread through the wood dampening half my wardrobe. These items also decided to start a garden of mold. I spend the rest of the week and all of my free time rewashing my laundry by hand with extra soap and bleach.
But you know, I've no reason to complain. The flood sucked, was an experience, but only a minor set back. Lessons learned include: it’s a good thing to trust my host family with my spare key, asking for cleaning gloves was a genius move (go me!), double check all future work of my ‘handyman’ uncle, I’m not really all that phased about losing half my possessions in a flood (only thing I really care about is the hard drive), and if something’s really important I need to take it with me when I leave. There are clichés that apply too. More money, more problems. Upscale living has upscale problems- because a hut in the village doesn’t have enclosed flooring. You get what you pay for (free plumbing). And something about how spring cleaning is therapeutic.
Thursday, July 22
Another Random List
Sometimes things occur to me as odd or peculiar, so I write them down and share. Get over it.
1) My mom’s ring tone is “Happy Birthday” all year round.
2) My dad’s on his 3rd car since I started my service. He offers me the keys every time I say I’m walking somewhere close. It makes me feel like using mass transit when I get back and skipping my next car purchase.
3) I wash 3-4 pieces of similarly colored laundry every morning. They soak during breakfast, and then I scrub and hang them on the line until after lunch.
4) Mangoes help me battle myself to floss my teeth regularly.
5) I might buy a mosquito net when I get back, as well as a fan, because I’ll think they help me sleep better. More comforted.
6) I make ice cream once a week, in search of the perfect recipe. I use Fosters Clark drink mix packets as flavoring.
7) The beach makes me sad, so I don’t go there. When I do, I just stare and think about Elk Lake.
8) I would give away half of my cloths and most of my shoes if I knew anyone my size. I just don’t want or use them.
9) Every day I feel more confused about what I want to do after Senegal. Is it possible to live in a bubble on the moon?
10) When it rains there’s still a hot gust of air that blows around my ankles. It actually feels nice as I hate cold feet.
11) Juicer, fryer, ice cream maker, microwave …we have them all. I think the only appliance my mom doesn’t have is a George Foreman. I often day dream about bringing one back to her for Christmas.
12) It makes me laugh hysterically to watch my youngest brothers eat spaghetti with a fork. They end up wearing much more than they eat every time.
13) If I had to leave Senegal today the only thing I’d really need to take with me, besides my passport, is the hard drive back up of all my pictures. Who needs suitcases?
14) I’m considering changing my favorite fruit proclamation from a lifelong obsession with raspberries to the magical and wonderful corossol, or soursop in English, (which is similar to guava, but oh so much better)!
15) Sometimes I forget how to spell my real last name. I never use it so when someone asks, and I have to spell it with French letters, I get thoroughly confused. I frequently miss-type it on French keyboards as well.
1) My mom’s ring tone is “Happy Birthday” all year round.
2) My dad’s on his 3rd car since I started my service. He offers me the keys every time I say I’m walking somewhere close. It makes me feel like using mass transit when I get back and skipping my next car purchase.
3) I wash 3-4 pieces of similarly colored laundry every morning. They soak during breakfast, and then I scrub and hang them on the line until after lunch.
4) Mangoes help me battle myself to floss my teeth regularly.
5) I might buy a mosquito net when I get back, as well as a fan, because I’ll think they help me sleep better. More comforted.
6) I make ice cream once a week, in search of the perfect recipe. I use Fosters Clark drink mix packets as flavoring.
7) The beach makes me sad, so I don’t go there. When I do, I just stare and think about Elk Lake.
8) I would give away half of my cloths and most of my shoes if I knew anyone my size. I just don’t want or use them.
9) Every day I feel more confused about what I want to do after Senegal. Is it possible to live in a bubble on the moon?
10) When it rains there’s still a hot gust of air that blows around my ankles. It actually feels nice as I hate cold feet.
11) Juicer, fryer, ice cream maker, microwave …we have them all. I think the only appliance my mom doesn’t have is a George Foreman. I often day dream about bringing one back to her for Christmas.
12) It makes me laugh hysterically to watch my youngest brothers eat spaghetti with a fork. They end up wearing much more than they eat every time.
13) If I had to leave Senegal today the only thing I’d really need to take with me, besides my passport, is the hard drive back up of all my pictures. Who needs suitcases?
14) I’m considering changing my favorite fruit proclamation from a lifelong obsession with raspberries to the magical and wonderful corossol, or soursop in English, (which is similar to guava, but oh so much better)!
15) Sometimes I forget how to spell my real last name. I never use it so when someone asks, and I have to spell it with French letters, I get thoroughly confused. I frequently miss-type it on French keyboards as well.
Monday, July 19
Development Work
My experience with development work is extremely lacking, and probably a bit narrow in focus. I preface this piece by saying that everything I talk about has been observed only here in Senegal. But somehow, I get the feeling we (me and the inhabitants of Mboro) aren’t alone. I’ve mentioned the women’s group before, and I use them as my best example to describe the chaos:
The women, like most villages or groups, were initially partnered with this or that organization from some North American or European country. Things were kicked off with construction of a lovely building, installation of all the latest equipment, and the purchase of raw materials. At this point, the 1st world partners deem the project a success. They take pictures, hold ceremonies, report to people back home, and move on to the next project… but the work has only just begun.
I see time and time again, things get set up and left for the masses to prosper… except that everything given to them is new and foreign. Perhaps they never wanted it in the first place, so they ignore what was given. Westerners import our way of life and give it to the people to “make their lives better.” What we fail to see is that these are people who have their own way about things. One tiny example is the potato peeler I gave my mom. It’s faster for me to use because I’ve been doing it all my life. But she uses a paring knife, and is thus faster with that. Not to mention the fact that she thinks my peeler is a bit ridiculous because it has only one function. At least with her knife she can then cut the potatoes afterwards…
Another pit fall to the ‘set up and go’ style of development is that perhaps the people have no idea how to operate or maintain the project results, so at the first sign of problem nearly all is lost. I’ve heard stories of water towers rendered entirely useless (if not a hindering) to the whole town because no one knew the problem was a simple change in lever. This is more ludicrous in my mind than the potato peeler because if the developers had stuck around long enough to give the proper training, the women wouldn’t have to walk so much farther just to pull water from the well outside town… the closest point of water not connected to the useless tower.
Please, don’t be discouraged yet because the list of problems does continue. As an American I grew up with the idea that to grow requires investment. A business can’t get bigger unless you buy more machines to make more products to sell and earn more profit. I therefore figure that a developing country is somehow similar. You need to invest in the ability to produce what is needed. (Probably more important is the need to invest in education, but I’ll get to that). Unfortunately, the agencies that come in and do the investing do just that and nothing more. They don’t take the time to explain our mentality of ‘invest to grow,’ thus our third problem is the reinforced mentality that in order to rise above poverty the people need to be first given something. The people stand around with their hands out waiting for their chance because from their point of view it’s only the people that receive that make it in life. They fail to see what I do: that ‘invest to grow’ mentality where by which the bigger the initial investment the faster the elimination of poverty. It makes sense in our minds, I realize that, but it’s not translating properly.
The fastest feel good way to help a cause is to give money. Money goes a long way in developing countries… but there is a limit. If you only give money, the people only get a water tower. They don’t get the training to use and properly maintain the water tower. Education is the perhaps my biggest complaint with development as an industry. Educate the people in our philosophies; explain why investment leads to prosperity. Educate the people with the skills they don’t have. If you do something for someone once, whatever was needed will get done. The problem is technically solved. But you haven’t done anything to help that person long term. What happens when the same problem arises again after you’ve gone?
Does anyone remember that old ABC Warehouse commercial? The one where they used the quote “Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime” and then went on to sell him an oven and he’ll eat better. Or something like that. The point is: my opinion of Peace Corps is just that. I’m happy to teach you how to do something. Here’s how to use a computer and create an email account… now you can keep in contact with business partners. Here’s how you make a promotional flyer… now you can market your products better. Here’s how to create a business (with a model or plan)… now you can open that boutique.
Unfortunately, I’m constantly battling the people with their hands out. I need to sift through the people with an arbitrary hand out to those who are truly motivated. I need to find people willing to put in the time and effort to learn a new skill, as opposed to those who just want something done for them. However, it needs to be said that sometimes, I do need to just bite the bullet and do it myself. Back to the women’s groups: they don’t understand what I mean when I say we should create a promotional flyer for their open house this week. They don’t know what one is. It would take way too long to explain marketing and promotional materials (and their benefits), more time than we have before the event. Therefore, I need to just do it myself. And then hopefully, they will see what I’m speaking of, get excited, and ask me to teach them more. “Hopefully” is quite a dangerous word here. Or maybe I’m confusing dangerous with open ended. I hope a lot of things happen… but if I can get just one good idea or project cranked out then perhaps my stint in Mboro will be that much more successful when compared to the above relayed stories of development. Hopefully.
The women, like most villages or groups, were initially partnered with this or that organization from some North American or European country. Things were kicked off with construction of a lovely building, installation of all the latest equipment, and the purchase of raw materials. At this point, the 1st world partners deem the project a success. They take pictures, hold ceremonies, report to people back home, and move on to the next project… but the work has only just begun.
I see time and time again, things get set up and left for the masses to prosper… except that everything given to them is new and foreign. Perhaps they never wanted it in the first place, so they ignore what was given. Westerners import our way of life and give it to the people to “make their lives better.” What we fail to see is that these are people who have their own way about things. One tiny example is the potato peeler I gave my mom. It’s faster for me to use because I’ve been doing it all my life. But she uses a paring knife, and is thus faster with that. Not to mention the fact that she thinks my peeler is a bit ridiculous because it has only one function. At least with her knife she can then cut the potatoes afterwards…
Another pit fall to the ‘set up and go’ style of development is that perhaps the people have no idea how to operate or maintain the project results, so at the first sign of problem nearly all is lost. I’ve heard stories of water towers rendered entirely useless (if not a hindering) to the whole town because no one knew the problem was a simple change in lever. This is more ludicrous in my mind than the potato peeler because if the developers had stuck around long enough to give the proper training, the women wouldn’t have to walk so much farther just to pull water from the well outside town… the closest point of water not connected to the useless tower.
Please, don’t be discouraged yet because the list of problems does continue. As an American I grew up with the idea that to grow requires investment. A business can’t get bigger unless you buy more machines to make more products to sell and earn more profit. I therefore figure that a developing country is somehow similar. You need to invest in the ability to produce what is needed. (Probably more important is the need to invest in education, but I’ll get to that). Unfortunately, the agencies that come in and do the investing do just that and nothing more. They don’t take the time to explain our mentality of ‘invest to grow,’ thus our third problem is the reinforced mentality that in order to rise above poverty the people need to be first given something. The people stand around with their hands out waiting for their chance because from their point of view it’s only the people that receive that make it in life. They fail to see what I do: that ‘invest to grow’ mentality where by which the bigger the initial investment the faster the elimination of poverty. It makes sense in our minds, I realize that, but it’s not translating properly.
The fastest feel good way to help a cause is to give money. Money goes a long way in developing countries… but there is a limit. If you only give money, the people only get a water tower. They don’t get the training to use and properly maintain the water tower. Education is the perhaps my biggest complaint with development as an industry. Educate the people in our philosophies; explain why investment leads to prosperity. Educate the people with the skills they don’t have. If you do something for someone once, whatever was needed will get done. The problem is technically solved. But you haven’t done anything to help that person long term. What happens when the same problem arises again after you’ve gone?
Does anyone remember that old ABC Warehouse commercial? The one where they used the quote “Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime” and then went on to sell him an oven and he’ll eat better. Or something like that. The point is: my opinion of Peace Corps is just that. I’m happy to teach you how to do something. Here’s how to use a computer and create an email account… now you can keep in contact with business partners. Here’s how you make a promotional flyer… now you can market your products better. Here’s how to create a business (with a model or plan)… now you can open that boutique.
Unfortunately, I’m constantly battling the people with their hands out. I need to sift through the people with an arbitrary hand out to those who are truly motivated. I need to find people willing to put in the time and effort to learn a new skill, as opposed to those who just want something done for them. However, it needs to be said that sometimes, I do need to just bite the bullet and do it myself. Back to the women’s groups: they don’t understand what I mean when I say we should create a promotional flyer for their open house this week. They don’t know what one is. It would take way too long to explain marketing and promotional materials (and their benefits), more time than we have before the event. Therefore, I need to just do it myself. And then hopefully, they will see what I’m speaking of, get excited, and ask me to teach them more. “Hopefully” is quite a dangerous word here. Or maybe I’m confusing dangerous with open ended. I hope a lot of things happen… but if I can get just one good idea or project cranked out then perhaps my stint in Mboro will be that much more successful when compared to the above relayed stories of development. Hopefully.
Tuesday, July 13
Marketing
The theme of July seems to be marketing. In continuing with a series of train-the-trainer classes I’ve begun teaching, July’s topic is- you guessed it- marketing. So I’ve read the French 101 version, learning all the new vocabulary for concepts I’d long ago committed to memory. After that I ran around town trying to think of ways to make the class interesting. Start with the 4 Ps, right? To spice it up we’ll talk about all the different ways to buy a coke (with examples) …and then two hours later I’m facing just under 2 days of remaining class time to nail the concept home.
Realizing that promotion is the most important of the Ps as far as Mboro is concerned, I plan to dedicate the rest of our time to just that… with a few tips on selling. In the afternoon of the first day, we’ll split into teams and do a “treasure hunt” or tour of Mboro to pick out the best, worst, most effective, most attractive, useless, and other types of promotion or marketing that exist. Most collective group wins? What they win is TBD… so if you have any ideas speak up. My hope is to spark a conversation about what’s going on in Mboro and Senegal in general. What works and what doesn’t? What is over done? What are the under played gems? What catches your eye?
Day 2 will kick off with a real world example. A local women’s group is having problems selling their product. Perhaps no one knows about it, perhaps the price isn’t right… whatever it is I figure this 3rd party group of students will be perfect test subjects. I’ve invited a few women from the organization talk about their product (and let’s face it: learn something too). Then we’ll dive in- create a marketing plan uniquely tailored for this exact product in our town. I figure practice makes perfect and if we all do a marketing plan together the group will remember that and be able to recreate the model in their respective villages or their friend’s boutiques.
The last afternoon should be dedicated to being a good salesperson. How do you treat the customer? We have this handy game, that for whatever reason is titled “The Best Game,” that is useful for demonstrating hypothetical market places. We’ve played this game with the group before, demonstrating the need to produce a quality product or to properly account for your money, but I suppose this time I’ll need to find a way to demonstrate being a good seller.
But it doesn’t just end with this 2 day class. Because in case you didn’t catch it, I’ve made contact with the local women’s groups (operating like small scale minority businesses in the States) that are having problems selling their product. I’m afraid if I explain the their predicament now I’ll get bogged down in a rant on the problems with development work in general- a topic best saved for another day. In any case, I’m working on a general marketing strategy with the group which includes a tasting/ open house event a week from Friday. Miraculously, this wasn’t my idea. But I am generating ideas for the event such as creating a guest book for visitors that can be contacted later with promotional ideas we haven’t yet thought of, conducting a product survey so we can consider what updates should be made to the product, and working up promotional materials on each product to provide visual aids to the event. After said event, we’ll have to dive into more marketing strategies like finding unique product names, creating logos, revamping packaging, generating a slogan …and the list goes on.
One final bit of work is the marketing- or rather advertising- we’ll be doing for the girls summer camp my fellow volunteers and I are hosting this coming September. We’re very close to raising all the money… but can’t officially kick anything off until we have every last cent. So if any of you know someone looking for a feel-good donation project please point them in my direction. If you thought I was joking when I said this month was all about marketing, I’m not. To pour salt directly in the wound, I started watching Mad Med from season 1.
Marketing is coming at me from all sides. What is it they say, "when it rains, it pours?" It's probably my fault for getting excited about something and doing everything I can to help that project take off. I guess we already knew I was the kind of person that always has work on the mind, and that doesn’t seem to change just because my location does. Even in Senegal, I work up until dinner and through the weekends. I think about things in the shower, and talk about them when I'm with friends, like I don't have an 'off' button. But that's ok, I'm hoping it continues.
Realizing that promotion is the most important of the Ps as far as Mboro is concerned, I plan to dedicate the rest of our time to just that… with a few tips on selling. In the afternoon of the first day, we’ll split into teams and do a “treasure hunt” or tour of Mboro to pick out the best, worst, most effective, most attractive, useless, and other types of promotion or marketing that exist. Most collective group wins? What they win is TBD… so if you have any ideas speak up. My hope is to spark a conversation about what’s going on in Mboro and Senegal in general. What works and what doesn’t? What is over done? What are the under played gems? What catches your eye?
Day 2 will kick off with a real world example. A local women’s group is having problems selling their product. Perhaps no one knows about it, perhaps the price isn’t right… whatever it is I figure this 3rd party group of students will be perfect test subjects. I’ve invited a few women from the organization talk about their product (and let’s face it: learn something too). Then we’ll dive in- create a marketing plan uniquely tailored for this exact product in our town. I figure practice makes perfect and if we all do a marketing plan together the group will remember that and be able to recreate the model in their respective villages or their friend’s boutiques.
The last afternoon should be dedicated to being a good salesperson. How do you treat the customer? We have this handy game, that for whatever reason is titled “The Best Game,” that is useful for demonstrating hypothetical market places. We’ve played this game with the group before, demonstrating the need to produce a quality product or to properly account for your money, but I suppose this time I’ll need to find a way to demonstrate being a good seller.
But it doesn’t just end with this 2 day class. Because in case you didn’t catch it, I’ve made contact with the local women’s groups (operating like small scale minority businesses in the States) that are having problems selling their product. I’m afraid if I explain the their predicament now I’ll get bogged down in a rant on the problems with development work in general- a topic best saved for another day. In any case, I’m working on a general marketing strategy with the group which includes a tasting/ open house event a week from Friday. Miraculously, this wasn’t my idea. But I am generating ideas for the event such as creating a guest book for visitors that can be contacted later with promotional ideas we haven’t yet thought of, conducting a product survey so we can consider what updates should be made to the product, and working up promotional materials on each product to provide visual aids to the event. After said event, we’ll have to dive into more marketing strategies like finding unique product names, creating logos, revamping packaging, generating a slogan …and the list goes on.
One final bit of work is the marketing- or rather advertising- we’ll be doing for the girls summer camp my fellow volunteers and I are hosting this coming September. We’re very close to raising all the money… but can’t officially kick anything off until we have every last cent. So if any of you know someone looking for a feel-good donation project please point them in my direction. If you thought I was joking when I said this month was all about marketing, I’m not. To pour salt directly in the wound, I started watching Mad Med from season 1.
Marketing is coming at me from all sides. What is it they say, "when it rains, it pours?" It's probably my fault for getting excited about something and doing everything I can to help that project take off. I guess we already knew I was the kind of person that always has work on the mind, and that doesn’t seem to change just because my location does. Even in Senegal, I work up until dinner and through the weekends. I think about things in the shower, and talk about them when I'm with friends, like I don't have an 'off' button. But that's ok, I'm hoping it continues.
Sunday, July 11
Kedougou 4th of July
The morning of the 4th I woke up tired and exhausted. I hadn’t slept well the night before and needed a change to remedy the situation. Everyone else seemed ready for fun… so I showered and ducked out quickly. I avoided the 4k race my fellow Americans organized through the streets of town… complete with American music and announcers. Instead, A friend had rented a hotel room a little ways down the road and was kind enough to let me borrow the bed for a few hours. I joined my friends for breakfast at the hotel before taking my nap. What a treat, as the room had a private bath and air conditioning!
A couple hours into the afternoon, I was woken up by a phone call from my Dad! The first time my family was able to get a hold of me for my birthday (not counting the lost calls in the middle of nowhere). Unlike the sadness I felt on Christmas, this conversation was filled with the telling of my birthday adventure. I don’t know if that’s a sign that Christmas means more to me, or if I’m just plain adjusting my current life. Either way, I conclude it was a great talk.
Straightening out my new dress (made from fabric bought in Thies and by my tailor in Mboro), I headed back to the Kedougou regional house and 4th of July party. Entrance to the party was about $10 and went towards all you can handle food and booze. Large tents, tables, chairs and speakers had been set up. I walked in minutes before the beer pong tournament started… kicked off of course by a rendition of the National Anthem. My friends sported red, white, and blue colors along with American flag apparel to add to the festivities.
Over 600 beers were commissioned for the event… and enough ice to match. One’s drink alternative consisted of what we fondly call gissap… which is a mixture of gin and bissap (or hibiscus flower) juice- the African equivalent to cranberry. Peanuts, popcorn, and bread and dips were littered about the party. More American music and games kept us entertained for hours. The manliest of men in our bunch had gotten up at dawn to procure the 3 pigs we were to consume; cleaned, trimmed, grilled, and roasted in pits dug in the backyard. They did a truly amazing job, especially considering they coupled the pork with homemade barbeque sauce and baked beans. In addition, potato salad and other American-esque dishes were served for dinner.
The rest of the evening, not that I fully recall it all, consisted of fireworks, a dance party, glow sticks, ice water and beer baths, and so much more fun. Perhaps the best part about my 4th was the general ambiance. Singing American songs, speaking English, wearing our colors, eating familiar foods, playing favorite games… was wonderful. It was like being at home with friends and family.
I suppose I’ve also gotten to a point in my service where the people here are like friends and family all rolled into one- without offense to those of you reading this at home. They are the ones I can call (cheaply and quickly) when crazy or stupid things happen. They are the ones who understand. They hold my hand or give me a hug. They are the ones with which I make treasured American substitute meals. We sweat and laugh off insults together. We exchange movies we wouldn’t normally watch in the real world and new words in languages we don’t always enjoy speaking.
My fellow PCVs, I enjoy your company more than you realize. I look forward to every opportunity we have to get together, no matter how grandiose or insignificant. I enjoy our stupid text conversations and our inside jokes. I hereby profess my 4th of July love to you. It may just be my current surroundings, but you mean the world to me. Thank you not only for an excellent holiday but, more importantly, thanks for every other not so special day.
A couple hours into the afternoon, I was woken up by a phone call from my Dad! The first time my family was able to get a hold of me for my birthday (not counting the lost calls in the middle of nowhere). Unlike the sadness I felt on Christmas, this conversation was filled with the telling of my birthday adventure. I don’t know if that’s a sign that Christmas means more to me, or if I’m just plain adjusting my current life. Either way, I conclude it was a great talk.
Straightening out my new dress (made from fabric bought in Thies and by my tailor in Mboro), I headed back to the Kedougou regional house and 4th of July party. Entrance to the party was about $10 and went towards all you can handle food and booze. Large tents, tables, chairs and speakers had been set up. I walked in minutes before the beer pong tournament started… kicked off of course by a rendition of the National Anthem. My friends sported red, white, and blue colors along with American flag apparel to add to the festivities.
Over 600 beers were commissioned for the event… and enough ice to match. One’s drink alternative consisted of what we fondly call gissap… which is a mixture of gin and bissap (or hibiscus flower) juice- the African equivalent to cranberry. Peanuts, popcorn, and bread and dips were littered about the party. More American music and games kept us entertained for hours. The manliest of men in our bunch had gotten up at dawn to procure the 3 pigs we were to consume; cleaned, trimmed, grilled, and roasted in pits dug in the backyard. They did a truly amazing job, especially considering they coupled the pork with homemade barbeque sauce and baked beans. In addition, potato salad and other American-esque dishes were served for dinner.
The rest of the evening, not that I fully recall it all, consisted of fireworks, a dance party, glow sticks, ice water and beer baths, and so much more fun. Perhaps the best part about my 4th was the general ambiance. Singing American songs, speaking English, wearing our colors, eating familiar foods, playing favorite games… was wonderful. It was like being at home with friends and family.
I suppose I’ve also gotten to a point in my service where the people here are like friends and family all rolled into one- without offense to those of you reading this at home. They are the ones I can call (cheaply and quickly) when crazy or stupid things happen. They are the ones who understand. They hold my hand or give me a hug. They are the ones with which I make treasured American substitute meals. We sweat and laugh off insults together. We exchange movies we wouldn’t normally watch in the real world and new words in languages we don’t always enjoy speaking.
My fellow PCVs, I enjoy your company more than you realize. I look forward to every opportunity we have to get together, no matter how grandiose or insignificant. I enjoy our stupid text conversations and our inside jokes. I hereby profess my 4th of July love to you. It may just be my current surroundings, but you mean the world to me. Thank you not only for an excellent holiday but, more importantly, thanks for every other not so special day.
Wednesday, July 7
27th Birthday
As this past weekend was a plethora of fun stories… I will be forced to submit the following in 2 parts. First, let’s tackle my 27th birthday. I figure the official start was the 1st when myself and 5 friends piled into a car headed for Kedougou, a destination on the far east side of the country where everything is lush and mountainous... a complete change of scenery. While it was nice to catch up with them, the 14 hours of travelling sucked. A few bright spots included: amazing bread in Tamba, warthog and monkey sightings whilst driving through Niokolo National Park, lush greenery and grass (this is a first in almost a year!), and the smell of fresh nature that seriously reminded me of Northern Michigan. That last one in itself was enough of a birthday present for me. We hung out with the people at the Kedougou regional house for the rest of the night and I even received some birthday calls after midnight.
The next day I woke up early to head out on a bike trip with Alex, Christine, and Mary. We packed up water and a few things to nibble on, jumped on our bikes and headed further south towards the Guinean border in the direction of the waterfalls. The trip was scheduled to be a 30K ride and about 2.5 hours. We wouldn’t figure it out until much later, but about 40 minutes in… we got ourselves seriously lost. Around the time we found the field of termite mounds we called a local PCV asking for help. Go back to the main road or find someone to lead you there. We thought we’d done that; a few times.
On one of the detours, my bike decided to take on a large rock- leaving me as a victim. The bike seat was mangled, the rock broken into 3 pieces, and I received cuts and bruises on my knees and a gash on my elbow. The battle seemed to end in a three way tie, though I deem the whole thing unnecessary. Anyway, back to the story…
After following a few different paths until reaching dead ends we came across a small gathering of huts. Only one teenage boy spoke a little French; the rest of people spoke Pulaar and unfortunately everyone I was with had learned Wolof. We asked where two villages (consecutively lined up off the “main road”) and the waterfalls were… and received charade gestures pointing in three different directions. Where’s the main road? A 4th direction was pointed out and seemed to be a compromise of everything else, so we took it. It was as though we had an aversion to turning around and going back.
After another episode of following multiple dead-ending paths, we came upon farming field. A Pulaar man was standing in the middle of it… so we hoped the hedge to ask for directions. His French was a bit better, and when another man upon the field, they guided us into their village. We sat in the shade, greeted the people, drank cool water they’d drawn from the far away well, and headed off in yet another direction… towards the main road. This path became progressively larger and more promising. We did eventually make it back to the infamous main road, and I estimate the whole detour consuming 4 hours of our day.
By then, we found ourselves squarely in the heat of the day, lacking water, and hungry. The terrain turned to stretches of almost flat rock mixed with sand. We eventually made it to Segou, the home of a fellow volunteer, and got our second wind by the well. We were only 5K away (and we assume at this point we’d at least doubled the originally estimated distance).
However, the second wind died just as quickly as it came and at some point I lost control of the bike and went face first into the sand. I was no longer having fun… but stopping at every large tree to catch my breath in the shade. At some point I felt like I’d hit a breaking point and could not move any more. Christine and I sat there together, under a tree, discussing our levels of dehydration. I could swear I heard the waterfalls. She saw things that weren’t there. I had diarrhea. Neither of us had eaten much that day. And miraculously a car came alone. Even more amazing is that inside was a fellow volunteer who happened to be escorting a group of aid workers. They stopped and gave us some fruit to nibble on, as well as some words of encouragement.
Just a few minutes after we made it to our final destination, Dindefello, a thunderstorm came crashing in. We took refuge in a sandwich shop and pondered the 8 hour bike ride that should have taken under 3. I finally got something decent to eat. After the rain subsided, we took to the path by foot into the forest in search of the waterfall. We opted to go without the tour guide under the guise of “Well, we’ve come this far without one… why cheat now?”
Naturally, this means we came upon a fork in the road and had to make yet another decision about which direction to take. Simple reasoning took over. We shut up and followed the sound of water. This time I wasn’t imagining things. Eventually the path became less apparent as the recent storm had destroyed basic evidence, but subtle signs of previous visitors kept us encouraged. We crossed a stream a few times, holding hands for security as the recent rains were overflowing the beds. Eventually we came to another critical moment of despair. The stream seemed too dangerous to cross, and we couldn’t make out a path on the other side… but we’d come too far to go home without success. And low and behold, not more than a minute after making the treacherous cross did we catch our first glimpse of the falls.
When we finally got to the base, the sights were amazing. The waterfall appeared to be at the corner of two enormous walls coming together… and was so tall you couldn’t possibly see the whole thing from top to bottom in one look. We took a few quick pictures as the rain was still in the air and magnifying the gush of the falls, a recipe for the destruction of any camera. And, as mine is all but officially broken anyway, they were taken with someone else’s camera. This means you’ll all have to wait for the proof.
The next day, I considered a do-over. Back in Kedougou, I hung out by a hotel pool with my friends. We ate warthog sandwiches, drank beers, and listened to American music. After a nap, a few of us went to one of the nicest restaurants in town for a birthday dinner. While the 2nd attempt felt more normal, the official birthday is probably what I’ll remember as the most adventurous birthday of my life.
The next day I woke up early to head out on a bike trip with Alex, Christine, and Mary. We packed up water and a few things to nibble on, jumped on our bikes and headed further south towards the Guinean border in the direction of the waterfalls. The trip was scheduled to be a 30K ride and about 2.5 hours. We wouldn’t figure it out until much later, but about 40 minutes in… we got ourselves seriously lost. Around the time we found the field of termite mounds we called a local PCV asking for help. Go back to the main road or find someone to lead you there. We thought we’d done that; a few times.
On one of the detours, my bike decided to take on a large rock- leaving me as a victim. The bike seat was mangled, the rock broken into 3 pieces, and I received cuts and bruises on my knees and a gash on my elbow. The battle seemed to end in a three way tie, though I deem the whole thing unnecessary. Anyway, back to the story…
After following a few different paths until reaching dead ends we came across a small gathering of huts. Only one teenage boy spoke a little French; the rest of people spoke Pulaar and unfortunately everyone I was with had learned Wolof. We asked where two villages (consecutively lined up off the “main road”) and the waterfalls were… and received charade gestures pointing in three different directions. Where’s the main road? A 4th direction was pointed out and seemed to be a compromise of everything else, so we took it. It was as though we had an aversion to turning around and going back.
After another episode of following multiple dead-ending paths, we came upon farming field. A Pulaar man was standing in the middle of it… so we hoped the hedge to ask for directions. His French was a bit better, and when another man upon the field, they guided us into their village. We sat in the shade, greeted the people, drank cool water they’d drawn from the far away well, and headed off in yet another direction… towards the main road. This path became progressively larger and more promising. We did eventually make it back to the infamous main road, and I estimate the whole detour consuming 4 hours of our day.
By then, we found ourselves squarely in the heat of the day, lacking water, and hungry. The terrain turned to stretches of almost flat rock mixed with sand. We eventually made it to Segou, the home of a fellow volunteer, and got our second wind by the well. We were only 5K away (and we assume at this point we’d at least doubled the originally estimated distance).
However, the second wind died just as quickly as it came and at some point I lost control of the bike and went face first into the sand. I was no longer having fun… but stopping at every large tree to catch my breath in the shade. At some point I felt like I’d hit a breaking point and could not move any more. Christine and I sat there together, under a tree, discussing our levels of dehydration. I could swear I heard the waterfalls. She saw things that weren’t there. I had diarrhea. Neither of us had eaten much that day. And miraculously a car came alone. Even more amazing is that inside was a fellow volunteer who happened to be escorting a group of aid workers. They stopped and gave us some fruit to nibble on, as well as some words of encouragement.
Just a few minutes after we made it to our final destination, Dindefello, a thunderstorm came crashing in. We took refuge in a sandwich shop and pondered the 8 hour bike ride that should have taken under 3. I finally got something decent to eat. After the rain subsided, we took to the path by foot into the forest in search of the waterfall. We opted to go without the tour guide under the guise of “Well, we’ve come this far without one… why cheat now?”
Naturally, this means we came upon a fork in the road and had to make yet another decision about which direction to take. Simple reasoning took over. We shut up and followed the sound of water. This time I wasn’t imagining things. Eventually the path became less apparent as the recent storm had destroyed basic evidence, but subtle signs of previous visitors kept us encouraged. We crossed a stream a few times, holding hands for security as the recent rains were overflowing the beds. Eventually we came to another critical moment of despair. The stream seemed too dangerous to cross, and we couldn’t make out a path on the other side… but we’d come too far to go home without success. And low and behold, not more than a minute after making the treacherous cross did we catch our first glimpse of the falls.
When we finally got to the base, the sights were amazing. The waterfall appeared to be at the corner of two enormous walls coming together… and was so tall you couldn’t possibly see the whole thing from top to bottom in one look. We took a few quick pictures as the rain was still in the air and magnifying the gush of the falls, a recipe for the destruction of any camera. And, as mine is all but officially broken anyway, they were taken with someone else’s camera. This means you’ll all have to wait for the proof.
The next day, I considered a do-over. Back in Kedougou, I hung out by a hotel pool with my friends. We ate warthog sandwiches, drank beers, and listened to American music. After a nap, a few of us went to one of the nicest restaurants in town for a birthday dinner. While the 2nd attempt felt more normal, the official birthday is probably what I’ll remember as the most adventurous birthday of my life.
Sunday, July 4
Will You Be My 2nd Wife?
Yeah, I’ve been asked, but I declined. It is time to describe what I’ve learned about polygamy Senegal style. First off, the legal stuff. A man may legally have up to 4 wives. When he marries the first one, and fills out the marriage license, he must at that time declare the number of wives we plans to have. He cannot change his mind later, legally. There is no penalty for an unfulfilled wife tally. However, should a man exceed his claim or limit, all subsequent wives have no claim on anything relevant, ever. It would seem the safe bet is to assume 4 wives from the beginning. Better to underachieve than underestimate?
Any of the wives may be the man’s niece (daughter of a brother) or a first cousin. This is to preserve the family ties, which are held with the utmost regard in West African culture; family is life. Although side effects of incest are prevalent (crossed eyes, limb deformities, etc), they are dismissed as God’s will.
A man usually takes his first wife in his late twenties. Traditions mandate that he is financially stable, and has a house (or at least space in the family compound) for him and the new bride to live in. Depending on the village, dowries must be paid- generally in cash or live stock form. First wife is forevermore the most important women of the household (that is unless Mom’s still around). She will make all decisions relating to spending of finances for food and clothing and be the guardian of her husband’s salary. She will give her husband as many children as possible (as birth control is completely unheard of both in African culture and the practice of Islam) until she becomes too tired.
Though I’ve generally heard the coming of the second wife described as a relief for the first one, who is no longer under continuous pressure to satisfy her husband, there have been occasions when she is not welcome. I talked to a woman once who was hurt that her husband said he loved another, younger women… but that there is nothing she can do about it. Second wife is a worker bee to the queen. She is tasked with all household chores of which first wife is tired. She will also produce as many children as possible.
Third and fourth wives are pretty much like the second; only hold less standing in the house hold. They also produce children and not only seem young in comparison to the husband, but truly are. I may have neglected to mention earlier that wives can be as young as early teens… and it doesn’t seem to matter how old the husband is. It’s as though every ten years the husband will find a new wife in her teens or early twenties and “start” a family all over again. Sometimes the wives all live together in one big compound- each wife getting a bedroom while their husband rotates around. Sometimes the families live in different towns… though the kids will take holidays to visit the other households.
As of recent, there’s been significant pushes for young girls to stay in school through high school before marrying. There have also been campaigns for the idea of family planning, or spacing between child births, so as not to stress the mothers and pocketbooks. I’ve spoken to males of my generation who claim they want nothing to do with more than one wife, then chuckle and say one women is crazy enough… who would ask for more of that? But quite frequently men are persuaded because multiple families are a sign of wealth (like having multiple cars in the US???) so it remains to be seen what will happen with this take on marriage.
Any of the wives may be the man’s niece (daughter of a brother) or a first cousin. This is to preserve the family ties, which are held with the utmost regard in West African culture; family is life. Although side effects of incest are prevalent (crossed eyes, limb deformities, etc), they are dismissed as God’s will.
A man usually takes his first wife in his late twenties. Traditions mandate that he is financially stable, and has a house (or at least space in the family compound) for him and the new bride to live in. Depending on the village, dowries must be paid- generally in cash or live stock form. First wife is forevermore the most important women of the household (that is unless Mom’s still around). She will make all decisions relating to spending of finances for food and clothing and be the guardian of her husband’s salary. She will give her husband as many children as possible (as birth control is completely unheard of both in African culture and the practice of Islam) until she becomes too tired.
Though I’ve generally heard the coming of the second wife described as a relief for the first one, who is no longer under continuous pressure to satisfy her husband, there have been occasions when she is not welcome. I talked to a woman once who was hurt that her husband said he loved another, younger women… but that there is nothing she can do about it. Second wife is a worker bee to the queen. She is tasked with all household chores of which first wife is tired. She will also produce as many children as possible.
Third and fourth wives are pretty much like the second; only hold less standing in the house hold. They also produce children and not only seem young in comparison to the husband, but truly are. I may have neglected to mention earlier that wives can be as young as early teens… and it doesn’t seem to matter how old the husband is. It’s as though every ten years the husband will find a new wife in her teens or early twenties and “start” a family all over again. Sometimes the wives all live together in one big compound- each wife getting a bedroom while their husband rotates around. Sometimes the families live in different towns… though the kids will take holidays to visit the other households.
As of recent, there’s been significant pushes for young girls to stay in school through high school before marrying. There have also been campaigns for the idea of family planning, or spacing between child births, so as not to stress the mothers and pocketbooks. I’ve spoken to males of my generation who claim they want nothing to do with more than one wife, then chuckle and say one women is crazy enough… who would ask for more of that? But quite frequently men are persuaded because multiple families are a sign of wealth (like having multiple cars in the US???) so it remains to be seen what will happen with this take on marriage.
Wednesday, June 30
My First Catholic Party
When I first landed in this sandbox, I was told that every Catholic is of Sereer ethnic group, but not every Sereer is Catholic… apparently this isn’t always true. I went to my first organized Catholic party last Sunday, and before you start groaning hear me out because it was a hell of a good time. To celebrate the end of a successful school year, the various ethnicities of the Mboro Catholic population put on a cultural soiree of food, dance, and dress.
We kicked off the party with a solid 2.5 hours of Catholic mass. For me this is a time to sit quietly, not be bothered, catch up on French Bible lingo, and think about other things during the Wolof bits. Hands down, the best part is the music. Think: fun loud southern Baptist choir with African drum beats and an undecipherable language. These people would probably beat them out in a Glee competition, though, because I’ve never heard anything like it. It’s impossible to remember your troubles or feel anything other than calm resolve for the week ahead after hearing them sing. Even the obviously sad songs are somehow inspiring. I can’t help but stare, but everyone else seems to take it for granted as I’m continually the only person parched from a mouth hanging wide open.
The second best part is the fashion show. The women dress in their best outfits with shawls and head wraps, heels, and purses all perfectly pressed and coordinating. During the communion procession, one can’t help but be mesmerized by the beautiful cloths parading by in styles never before seen, rendering the whole experience akin to Project Runway- Mboro Edition. Same goes for the men, sans accessories of course. One is considered luckier even still to behold a vision of the Virgin Mary; who makes frequent fabric appearances, with and without her son, and in various settings.
But this day was a lucky occasion, as many of the women dressed in the same fabric, albeit different dress styles, in honor of their designated ethnic group. This is normal party protocol. A few women from the group will head to Dakar to be the first to buy a newly printed style of cloth. And they buy as much of it as possible, if not the whole minting, in order to fabricate their coordinated ensembles. By my count, there were at least 4 different groups represented at this party.
After mass, the congregation gathered in the neighboring court yard for what can best be described as the African version of a Sunday picnic. The pews were brought out from the chapel to rest under the trees joined by plastic chairs, a few speakers, and a make shift wooden bar. Yes, a bar. You could walk up to it and order a beer, a bottle of wine, or a bottle of palm wine (which is rapidly fermenting sweet wine). All this can be found at the same price quoted at the local hole in the wall corner boutique, which goes to say it’s cheaper than any other restaurant/ bar in Mboro. The director of the accompanying Catholic elementary school, at which I frequently teach English, bought me my first ice cold Gazelle.
Interestingly enough, the whole party sat in separated sections; the young kids under one tree, the teenagers another. The women sat in fabric coordinated circles on one side of the bar, while the men sat on the other. Although I initially sat with a group of women, I was eventually called to the men’s circle because, as I was told, it was quite obvious that none of the women knew me and all my friends were the male teachers of the school anyway. Oh well, it tends to go that way in most of my experiences because 1) the men’s circle is an unofficial place of elevated status, 2) I’m white and therefore inherently prone to do bizarre things, and 3) I drink more than ½ a beer in a sitting. It probably didn’t help that I wasn’t wearing a coordinated outfit. Maybe next time…
We waited for lunch, served in traditional Senegalese style of large round plates of heaping food where everyone gets a spoon. In honor of the cultural celebration each ethnic group made a few plates of their traditional meals. My group was served a Sereer dish of tiny flakes of fish mixed into mashed beans porridge-style with hot sauce and limes on the side. Not knowing it was fish filled, I took a huge bite. And then promptly threw it up. A very kind gentlemen sitting next to me immediately got up and went in search of another plate. When he returned with a small plate of rice covered in sweet milk sauce, I couldn’t help but smile… it’s my favorite dish in Senegal. And this version was sprinkled with colorful fruit syrups adding to the splendor. Diolla and Manike were the only other ethnic groups I caught the names of… but the other ethnic dishes served were manioc leaf sauce over rice, fish and dumplings with tomato sauce, and a new twist on baked beans with ground beef.
After lunch, we continued drinking in our segregated circles, until it was time to dance! Each group of women was given the opportunity to play a grouping of their songs and show off their traditional dances. Either all the dances were basically the same, with the appearance of knee shaking, arm flinging gyration in conga line formation, or I wasn’t sober. I promised my friends that the minute an American song came on I would teach everyone how I dance… but the opportunity never presented itself. A shame.
As the heat dissipated, the afternoon turned to twilight, and the beers ran out… people started to stumble home. A hefty amount of pictures were taken, and I hope to post them soon. I had a great time, and mentioned so to my new friends when they all called to make sure I’d gotten home ok- a jester so Dad-esque it reminded me of my own. At which point, it had occurred to me that the company I kept represented men who were all within a few years of my own Dad’s age. And while I look forward to grilling and boating with Dad back home, I’m also anticipating the next excuse to gather here in Mboro.
We kicked off the party with a solid 2.5 hours of Catholic mass. For me this is a time to sit quietly, not be bothered, catch up on French Bible lingo, and think about other things during the Wolof bits. Hands down, the best part is the music. Think: fun loud southern Baptist choir with African drum beats and an undecipherable language. These people would probably beat them out in a Glee competition, though, because I’ve never heard anything like it. It’s impossible to remember your troubles or feel anything other than calm resolve for the week ahead after hearing them sing. Even the obviously sad songs are somehow inspiring. I can’t help but stare, but everyone else seems to take it for granted as I’m continually the only person parched from a mouth hanging wide open.
The second best part is the fashion show. The women dress in their best outfits with shawls and head wraps, heels, and purses all perfectly pressed and coordinating. During the communion procession, one can’t help but be mesmerized by the beautiful cloths parading by in styles never before seen, rendering the whole experience akin to Project Runway- Mboro Edition. Same goes for the men, sans accessories of course. One is considered luckier even still to behold a vision of the Virgin Mary; who makes frequent fabric appearances, with and without her son, and in various settings.
But this day was a lucky occasion, as many of the women dressed in the same fabric, albeit different dress styles, in honor of their designated ethnic group. This is normal party protocol. A few women from the group will head to Dakar to be the first to buy a newly printed style of cloth. And they buy as much of it as possible, if not the whole minting, in order to fabricate their coordinated ensembles. By my count, there were at least 4 different groups represented at this party.
After mass, the congregation gathered in the neighboring court yard for what can best be described as the African version of a Sunday picnic. The pews were brought out from the chapel to rest under the trees joined by plastic chairs, a few speakers, and a make shift wooden bar. Yes, a bar. You could walk up to it and order a beer, a bottle of wine, or a bottle of palm wine (which is rapidly fermenting sweet wine). All this can be found at the same price quoted at the local hole in the wall corner boutique, which goes to say it’s cheaper than any other restaurant/ bar in Mboro. The director of the accompanying Catholic elementary school, at which I frequently teach English, bought me my first ice cold Gazelle.
Interestingly enough, the whole party sat in separated sections; the young kids under one tree, the teenagers another. The women sat in fabric coordinated circles on one side of the bar, while the men sat on the other. Although I initially sat with a group of women, I was eventually called to the men’s circle because, as I was told, it was quite obvious that none of the women knew me and all my friends were the male teachers of the school anyway. Oh well, it tends to go that way in most of my experiences because 1) the men’s circle is an unofficial place of elevated status, 2) I’m white and therefore inherently prone to do bizarre things, and 3) I drink more than ½ a beer in a sitting. It probably didn’t help that I wasn’t wearing a coordinated outfit. Maybe next time…
We waited for lunch, served in traditional Senegalese style of large round plates of heaping food where everyone gets a spoon. In honor of the cultural celebration each ethnic group made a few plates of their traditional meals. My group was served a Sereer dish of tiny flakes of fish mixed into mashed beans porridge-style with hot sauce and limes on the side. Not knowing it was fish filled, I took a huge bite. And then promptly threw it up. A very kind gentlemen sitting next to me immediately got up and went in search of another plate. When he returned with a small plate of rice covered in sweet milk sauce, I couldn’t help but smile… it’s my favorite dish in Senegal. And this version was sprinkled with colorful fruit syrups adding to the splendor. Diolla and Manike were the only other ethnic groups I caught the names of… but the other ethnic dishes served were manioc leaf sauce over rice, fish and dumplings with tomato sauce, and a new twist on baked beans with ground beef.
After lunch, we continued drinking in our segregated circles, until it was time to dance! Each group of women was given the opportunity to play a grouping of their songs and show off their traditional dances. Either all the dances were basically the same, with the appearance of knee shaking, arm flinging gyration in conga line formation, or I wasn’t sober. I promised my friends that the minute an American song came on I would teach everyone how I dance… but the opportunity never presented itself. A shame.
As the heat dissipated, the afternoon turned to twilight, and the beers ran out… people started to stumble home. A hefty amount of pictures were taken, and I hope to post them soon. I had a great time, and mentioned so to my new friends when they all called to make sure I’d gotten home ok- a jester so Dad-esque it reminded me of my own. At which point, it had occurred to me that the company I kept represented men who were all within a few years of my own Dad’s age. And while I look forward to grilling and boating with Dad back home, I’m also anticipating the next excuse to gather here in Mboro.
Sunday, June 27
Losing Control
One of the hardest things I’ve had to deal with is losing control of everything around me. And some days it really feels like I’ve lost every battle. I can’t always say what I want to in French. I have to think of the words I know that will basically get the point across, but I have little room for personal speaking style. I can’t stop myself from getting sick all the time. I can’t control the climate of any of my surroundings because there’s no thermostat to change or sweater to put on or take off. I can’t change my shoes because anything other than flip flops gets filled with sand so quickly I can barely walk. I can’t choose which tailor I prefer to utilize for my clothing needs, because it’d be a big faux pas not to use my Mom’s. I can’t control what I’m eating, because I don’t cook any of my meals… even when I don’t eat fish I’m given an alternative meal prepared by the maid. I also have no control of when I eat. Lunch is anywhere from noon (weekends only) to 3p; Dinner is between 10 and 11p. I can’t control when the power goes out and comes back, and the same with the internet… apparently the Senegalese government can’t do that either.
I can’t seem to control my work schedule. I set appointments with people for specific times, though they never show up on time. Granted, they will generally appear within an hour- if they’re coming. I’ll schedule small computer classes, but none of the students show. Then they’ll pester me for months after about when the next class is. And they conveniently don’t understand my language when I tell them I have too many things to do and can’t always be waiting for them. “Ok then, just give me private lessons.” …As though I could trust them to a) show up on time then either and b) stick to the subject. No, I don’t want to show you how to use Skype and then talk to your friends. I can’t control the tendency of people with my phone number to call at all hours demanding I come over immediately to show them how to print something.
I can’t control how people treat me either. The little kids call me whitey or red ears, but I can’t seem to make them understand that it’s offensive. I’m constantly told to get over it; they just don’t know better. Well, TEACH THEM BETTER! I can’t control all the stupid things my host Mom gets mad at me for. No, I don’t want to listen to your friends talk about me in Wolof… so yeah, I’m leaving. I don’t want to teach English to kids because I have a degree in business… so yeah, I’m definitely not teaching your 4 year olds for 30 minutes each week. This will only make you feel better; they won’t learn a damn thing. And please don’t bother me with complaints about how other people are benefitting from my speaking English with them… when you will most likely get pissed the next time I speak English in a conversation you’re a part of. I can’t seem to entice people to learn why I do things differently.
I figured the lack of control would dissipate after PST. Back in those days I had a rigid schedule of language classes with a few bouts of health, culture, or security. My time wasn't my own, but that would come to an end... and I would have control again. Apparently not, because here I am every day, waking up when the kids decide to start screaming, eating what’s put in front of me, just dealing with the name calling on my way to meetings that probably won’t happen, sweating uncontrollably until after dinner when I then get to pass out at the moment I choose to give in. Hmm.
Actually, I have more choices than that. I can choose how many times I take a shower each day to rinse of the sand and sweat. I can choose which drink flavor I put in my water. I choose the music in my MP3 player, and what movie to watch at night while I wait for dinner. I can choose how much or how little to eat. I can choose to eat from my secret stash of protein at any time. I can choose how to react to the little kids that call me names, same with the grown adults. Do I laugh and say hello back? Do I say something offensive in return? Do I stop and explain that they shouldn’t call me that? Or do I just ignore them entirely? I can choose whom I agree to meet with, what day I’m available, and at what time. I can choose to be out of the sun in the heat of the day. I can choose to fill my evening hours with yoga or running instead of more classes. I can choose which direction my fan is pointed. I can choose to take a million vitamins every day, and to not spend time with my brothers when they are sick. I can choose…
In case you’re wondering the point of this ramble, let me put you at ease: there isn’t one. This is an exercise in talking out my frustrations and reminding myself that I’m in control of the little things. And that I’ll be able to live- or at least get by- without controlling the rest. Inshallah (here’s hoping). And truthfully, if the worst things I have to complain about are people calling me names, not working too hard, and a restricted diet... what the hell is wrong with me?
I can’t seem to control my work schedule. I set appointments with people for specific times, though they never show up on time. Granted, they will generally appear within an hour- if they’re coming. I’ll schedule small computer classes, but none of the students show. Then they’ll pester me for months after about when the next class is. And they conveniently don’t understand my language when I tell them I have too many things to do and can’t always be waiting for them. “Ok then, just give me private lessons.” …As though I could trust them to a) show up on time then either and b) stick to the subject. No, I don’t want to show you how to use Skype and then talk to your friends. I can’t control the tendency of people with my phone number to call at all hours demanding I come over immediately to show them how to print something.
I can’t control how people treat me either. The little kids call me whitey or red ears, but I can’t seem to make them understand that it’s offensive. I’m constantly told to get over it; they just don’t know better. Well, TEACH THEM BETTER! I can’t control all the stupid things my host Mom gets mad at me for. No, I don’t want to listen to your friends talk about me in Wolof… so yeah, I’m leaving. I don’t want to teach English to kids because I have a degree in business… so yeah, I’m definitely not teaching your 4 year olds for 30 minutes each week. This will only make you feel better; they won’t learn a damn thing. And please don’t bother me with complaints about how other people are benefitting from my speaking English with them… when you will most likely get pissed the next time I speak English in a conversation you’re a part of. I can’t seem to entice people to learn why I do things differently.
I figured the lack of control would dissipate after PST. Back in those days I had a rigid schedule of language classes with a few bouts of health, culture, or security. My time wasn't my own, but that would come to an end... and I would have control again. Apparently not, because here I am every day, waking up when the kids decide to start screaming, eating what’s put in front of me, just dealing with the name calling on my way to meetings that probably won’t happen, sweating uncontrollably until after dinner when I then get to pass out at the moment I choose to give in. Hmm.
Actually, I have more choices than that. I can choose how many times I take a shower each day to rinse of the sand and sweat. I can choose which drink flavor I put in my water. I choose the music in my MP3 player, and what movie to watch at night while I wait for dinner. I can choose how much or how little to eat. I can choose to eat from my secret stash of protein at any time. I can choose how to react to the little kids that call me names, same with the grown adults. Do I laugh and say hello back? Do I say something offensive in return? Do I stop and explain that they shouldn’t call me that? Or do I just ignore them entirely? I can choose whom I agree to meet with, what day I’m available, and at what time. I can choose to be out of the sun in the heat of the day. I can choose to fill my evening hours with yoga or running instead of more classes. I can choose which direction my fan is pointed. I can choose to take a million vitamins every day, and to not spend time with my brothers when they are sick. I can choose…
In case you’re wondering the point of this ramble, let me put you at ease: there isn’t one. This is an exercise in talking out my frustrations and reminding myself that I’m in control of the little things. And that I’ll be able to live- or at least get by- without controlling the rest. Inshallah (here’s hoping). And truthfully, if the worst things I have to complain about are people calling me names, not working too hard, and a restricted diet... what the hell is wrong with me?
Wednesday, June 23
50 Things I Never Expected to Happen:
1. Using a French keyboard often enough that my fingers start to forget where the letters are.
2. Wolof words entering the English language, ex. Poop.
3. Having dreams so vivid I wake up crying and call someone to make sure they aren’t real.
4. Wishing my 2 year old host brother was around when he’s gone.
5. Not falling in love with mangoes.
6. Being unable to think of something I’d like to have sent or brought from the States.
7. Day dreaming about having a Peace Corps issued horse.
8. Learning to create tourism websites in (and for) a 3rd world country.
9. Wishing I had enough money to buy a really nice camera.
10. Using an iPhone. Here, in Africa.
11. Not wanting to see the ocean.
12. Incorporating clicks and clucks in my vocabulary.
13. Scooping a fly out of my cold drink, and continuing to drink it.
14. Worrying constantly about how much trash I’m creating.
15. Having access to enough sugar for a self-induced diabetic coma.
16. Being called racist.
17. Having weekly, if not more, conversations with my predecessor.
18. Writing a semi-weekly blog.
19. Being jealous of my brother; who gets rocked to sleep every night.
20. Concluding that my real mother is somehow Wolof due to similar mannerisms.
21. Enjoying onion sauce.
22. Missing the rain, thunder and lightning, so much.
23. Viewing a traffic jam as an opportunity to shop.
24. Abandoning forever more my favorite cookie, Oreo, after a bad night of food poisoning.
25. Accepting cockroaches as part of my world.
26. Naming the lizard in my cubby bathroom: Steve.
27. Talking out loud to people who aren’t here, in a language they wouldn’t understand anyway.
28. Living with all the side effects of Mefloquine.
29. That there’s a tennis court in Mboro.
30. And a pool.
31. Listening to my host parents’ debate of getting a microwave.
32. Or air conditioning.
33. Being able to avoid eating fish at every meal.
34. My host Dad having a car.
35. Changing my mind about not wanting to go home.
36. Not writing in my journal daily like I did the last time I went abroad.
37. Having Wi-Fi internet in my room.
38. Feeling scandalous for dressing how I normally would in the States.
39. Liking Senegalese beer (Gazelle) more than any back home.
40. Wishing I’d packed fewer clothes.
41. And only 2 pairs of shoes.
42. My freckles falling off and the skin healing as if they were never there.
43. My hair curling the way I wanted it to in the states… but without the rollers.
44. Finding the ability to lose my temper quickly, but get over it just as quickly.
45. Making juice from dried hibiscus flowers.
46. Having an air conditioned office, but not going there every day.
47. Acquiring the ability to sit in a room with people for hours at a time and not talk.
48. Learning to operate on less than 6 hours of sleep.
49. Losing so much weight, so quickly.
50. Taking the Foreign Service Officer Test.
2. Wolof words entering the English language, ex. Poop.
3. Having dreams so vivid I wake up crying and call someone to make sure they aren’t real.
4. Wishing my 2 year old host brother was around when he’s gone.
5. Not falling in love with mangoes.
6. Being unable to think of something I’d like to have sent or brought from the States.
7. Day dreaming about having a Peace Corps issued horse.
8. Learning to create tourism websites in (and for) a 3rd world country.
9. Wishing I had enough money to buy a really nice camera.
10. Using an iPhone. Here, in Africa.
11. Not wanting to see the ocean.
12. Incorporating clicks and clucks in my vocabulary.
13. Scooping a fly out of my cold drink, and continuing to drink it.
14. Worrying constantly about how much trash I’m creating.
15. Having access to enough sugar for a self-induced diabetic coma.
16. Being called racist.
17. Having weekly, if not more, conversations with my predecessor.
18. Writing a semi-weekly blog.
19. Being jealous of my brother; who gets rocked to sleep every night.
20. Concluding that my real mother is somehow Wolof due to similar mannerisms.
21. Enjoying onion sauce.
22. Missing the rain, thunder and lightning, so much.
23. Viewing a traffic jam as an opportunity to shop.
24. Abandoning forever more my favorite cookie, Oreo, after a bad night of food poisoning.
25. Accepting cockroaches as part of my world.
26. Naming the lizard in my cubby bathroom: Steve.
27. Talking out loud to people who aren’t here, in a language they wouldn’t understand anyway.
28. Living with all the side effects of Mefloquine.
29. That there’s a tennis court in Mboro.
30. And a pool.
31. Listening to my host parents’ debate of getting a microwave.
32. Or air conditioning.
33. Being able to avoid eating fish at every meal.
34. My host Dad having a car.
35. Changing my mind about not wanting to go home.
36. Not writing in my journal daily like I did the last time I went abroad.
37. Having Wi-Fi internet in my room.
38. Feeling scandalous for dressing how I normally would in the States.
39. Liking Senegalese beer (Gazelle) more than any back home.
40. Wishing I’d packed fewer clothes.
41. And only 2 pairs of shoes.
42. My freckles falling off and the skin healing as if they were never there.
43. My hair curling the way I wanted it to in the states… but without the rollers.
44. Finding the ability to lose my temper quickly, but get over it just as quickly.
45. Making juice from dried hibiscus flowers.
46. Having an air conditioned office, but not going there every day.
47. Acquiring the ability to sit in a room with people for hours at a time and not talk.
48. Learning to operate on less than 6 hours of sleep.
49. Losing so much weight, so quickly.
50. Taking the Foreign Service Officer Test.
Sunday, June 20
Feeling Alone
I’m never really physically alone; there is always someone in the room. My bedroom door is never shut, because that would mean something is horribly wrong with me. I’ve started to feel weird about even shutting the door to pee in my cubby bathroom. But I feel alone almost all the time. Emotionally it is so hard to connect. Whether it is with my host family, friends I’ve made in town, or other Volunteers… it all seems so transient. Have we all accepted that this will be a temporary thing?
I taught my oldest host brother the word “hug,” and how to give one. He’s not too bad, and for a while he’d give me one every day when he got home from school. It made my day. Then, he became grumpy and told me he didn’t understand the significance. It’s hard to explain. Americans just crave contact more than the Senegalese. I don’t know how to explain why touching someone makes me feel better. The song “Lean on Me” sums it up right? We depend of friends to help us when we are weak? We lean on them, both figuratively and sometimes literally. In the end, he told me it was all mental and that I could change it if I tried. What if I don’t want to try? Who says there’s anything wrong with PDA?
And then there’s me trying to explain happy hour. It’s more than just an hour of discounted drink; it’s a time when coworkers go out to relieve stress. We complain about the job, we talk about life and we get to know each other. A guy I work with and I go for a drink occasionally, and I’ve spend a large amount of time explaining the relevance in American culture of ‘end of the week beer after work.’ I think he finally got it because he asked if we should be continuing to get beers every week- but this is after knowing him for eight months. Given this, you should understand why I would find my paltry version of happy hour a huge success.
Now, about those other PCVs. There seems to be this constant battle between needing a good friend and being paranoid that the other person could be taking it the wrong way. Or maybe it’s all my paranoid, Mefloquine popping, head. Back in my old life, there were coworkers I was cordial with and others that knew my whole life inside and out. Here in Africa, it feels like when I see another American/ coworker/ friend/ PCV that it’s such a rare opportunity that I regurgitate everything I would say to my closest friends without filter. Because hey, I can do it in English to someone who’ll get it! People here are amazingly supportive of each other, and by no means am I saying I am ungrateful. What I am saying is that there’s a part of me that, once done spitting out every last detail, wonders am I really closer to this person now, or was that just too much information?
With the sheer volume of different, and sometimes very frustrating, stimuli here, I need to get something off my chest quickly before it continues to bother me. So, I call or meet up with someone and we talk openly and candidly about the things we go through or see. It honestly feels almost like a secret knowing that no one else around can understand what’s being said. At first it’s mostly rant, but then it turns into a bigger picture conversation about the things we’ve learned, how and how quickly we’re changing, and the people we’ll become by having gone through this. And about this time, I realize I’ve just told someone enough detail about my life to put them squarely into my inner circle back at home… but what does that even mean here?
Interactions, as I’ve said, are few and far between. I go months without seeing friends from the northern or eastern parts of the country. So with a lack of time, I talk about things that matter… sometimes skipping the formalities and going straight to the meaty stuff. Which leads to my second concern of was that too much? Did I just force someone to listen to something they didn’t want to hear? Were they kindly listening, and nodding, and responding politely… but all the while thinking, “Geez, what did I get into? Remind me not to ask next time…”
So, I ask you, where do I draw the line between cordial and inner circle? Time is slipping past my African sand clock and I’m not entirely sure who’ll be left standing at the finish line. My host brothers, friends from town, PCVs that I’ve really only spend a few days in actual company with? Or are these relationships temporary and built on an immediate need that will fall away like the sand once I’m gone?
I’ll deal with the fallout when I get back as I’m quite certain that no matter how many questions I ask, nothing will be solved today. By and large, I’m surrounded by good people… and a few of them quite obviously do care for me. I suppose for now I’ll relax, stop worrying about it, be grateful, and maybe even consider getting off Mefloquine.
I taught my oldest host brother the word “hug,” and how to give one. He’s not too bad, and for a while he’d give me one every day when he got home from school. It made my day. Then, he became grumpy and told me he didn’t understand the significance. It’s hard to explain. Americans just crave contact more than the Senegalese. I don’t know how to explain why touching someone makes me feel better. The song “Lean on Me” sums it up right? We depend of friends to help us when we are weak? We lean on them, both figuratively and sometimes literally. In the end, he told me it was all mental and that I could change it if I tried. What if I don’t want to try? Who says there’s anything wrong with PDA?
And then there’s me trying to explain happy hour. It’s more than just an hour of discounted drink; it’s a time when coworkers go out to relieve stress. We complain about the job, we talk about life and we get to know each other. A guy I work with and I go for a drink occasionally, and I’ve spend a large amount of time explaining the relevance in American culture of ‘end of the week beer after work.’ I think he finally got it because he asked if we should be continuing to get beers every week- but this is after knowing him for eight months. Given this, you should understand why I would find my paltry version of happy hour a huge success.
Now, about those other PCVs. There seems to be this constant battle between needing a good friend and being paranoid that the other person could be taking it the wrong way. Or maybe it’s all my paranoid, Mefloquine popping, head. Back in my old life, there were coworkers I was cordial with and others that knew my whole life inside and out. Here in Africa, it feels like when I see another American/ coworker/ friend/ PCV that it’s such a rare opportunity that I regurgitate everything I would say to my closest friends without filter. Because hey, I can do it in English to someone who’ll get it! People here are amazingly supportive of each other, and by no means am I saying I am ungrateful. What I am saying is that there’s a part of me that, once done spitting out every last detail, wonders am I really closer to this person now, or was that just too much information?
With the sheer volume of different, and sometimes very frustrating, stimuli here, I need to get something off my chest quickly before it continues to bother me. So, I call or meet up with someone and we talk openly and candidly about the things we go through or see. It honestly feels almost like a secret knowing that no one else around can understand what’s being said. At first it’s mostly rant, but then it turns into a bigger picture conversation about the things we’ve learned, how and how quickly we’re changing, and the people we’ll become by having gone through this. And about this time, I realize I’ve just told someone enough detail about my life to put them squarely into my inner circle back at home… but what does that even mean here?
Interactions, as I’ve said, are few and far between. I go months without seeing friends from the northern or eastern parts of the country. So with a lack of time, I talk about things that matter… sometimes skipping the formalities and going straight to the meaty stuff. Which leads to my second concern of was that too much? Did I just force someone to listen to something they didn’t want to hear? Were they kindly listening, and nodding, and responding politely… but all the while thinking, “Geez, what did I get into? Remind me not to ask next time…”
So, I ask you, where do I draw the line between cordial and inner circle? Time is slipping past my African sand clock and I’m not entirely sure who’ll be left standing at the finish line. My host brothers, friends from town, PCVs that I’ve really only spend a few days in actual company with? Or are these relationships temporary and built on an immediate need that will fall away like the sand once I’m gone?
I’ll deal with the fallout when I get back as I’m quite certain that no matter how many questions I ask, nothing will be solved today. By and large, I’m surrounded by good people… and a few of them quite obviously do care for me. I suppose for now I’ll relax, stop worrying about it, be grateful, and maybe even consider getting off Mefloquine.
Wednesday, June 16
Foreign Service
I knew nothing about the Foreign Service before coming to Senegal. I try to keep my eyes and ears out for career opportunities that will enable me to fulfill much desired dream of living the expat life… but apparently I don’t know the right kinds of people or I’m not paying enough attention. This is evident in the fact that I didn’t investigate the Peace Corps until my 20s and no one really knew about it even while I applied. But the point isn’t Peace Corps, it’s the Foreign Service.
To be in the Foreign Service means to be an officer of the US State Department. This is the type of job you get in order to work the US embassies around the world. As I understand it, the job rotates countries of assignment every two years and comes with fun list of benefits including: ample vacation time and allowances, housing and health care completely covered, free shipping of my possessions around the world, and access to language and culture instruction. But anyone who really knows me understands that the ability to change countries every so often without having to go through the hell finding a job- well that’s the attraction.
There are 5 different departments within the ranks of Foreign Service: the consular, public diplomacy, economic, political, and management. I can attempt to provide a basic description as I get them, but I probably won’t do them justice. A consular officer works with the Americans abroad as well as VISA applications and fraud. Public diplomacy officers work like the PR department promoting the US and its culture, whilst learning the culture of the host country. Economics officers study the host economy happenings and provide linkages between entrepreneurs foreign and domestic. Political officers do just as one would imagine, schmooze with important people and spread the word of America. And management officers, the path I’ve personally chosen, operate as though the embassy was its own corporation with functions of human resources, finance and accounting, purchasing and contracts, etc.
From the get-go one has to choose their department, or cone as the lingo goes. I picked management because it’s what comes naturally, what I enjoy doing, and generally (I’m told) what I’m good at. A little background never hurt anyone either. It is worth mentioning that I did have strong interests in both the economics and public diplomacy cones. Economics because of my degree and general love of business opportunities (hello, small enterprise development volunteer…) and public diplomacy because I do so much enjoy planning events and explaining why Americans are the way they are. But alas, I have to follow my niche. It helps to hear that one can apparently take a sabbatical on occasion to work outside their chosen cone for a rotation.
Now that I’ve chosen a hypothetical career path, it’s on to the actual application. The process, like most government jobs, is a doozey. First up is a 3 hour long test. Depending on the results (a simple pass/ fail is all you’ll hear) they’ll ask you to write some personal essays. If you happen to speak a language deemed critical (Chinese, Arabic, etc) then someone will call you for an over the phone language test. The results of your test, essays, and language are sent to a panel for judgment; probably something like an HR review meeting after a first round of interviews. If you advance from this stage, it’s on to an oral exam done in a group setting with other contestants and a judgment panel in DC. They say this is the hardest part as many have not survived this round. Though if you do, you’re almost done, for all your scores are combined and you’re plopped onto a hiring list. Then one waits to be called up to service. And once you are, or maybe before, there are a few weeks of orientation and training in DC before heading out to your lucky embassy. I’m told your first few rotations are probationary… but soon enough one can earn tenure and enjoy the jet setting ex-pat life for a long time. Ah… to be so lucky.
Ok, before I get too ahead of myself in day dreams, I’m still back at the beginning. Preparation for the test was only mildly hindered by my current location. Realizing my 6 brothers are a constant distraction, I excused myself to Dakar for 4 days of study either pool side- catching some rays- or in the air conditioned office. Things could’ve been worse.
I did quite a few practice exams with multiple subjects as the exam is a scattering of knowledge: world history and geography, US culture, mathematics, communications, US history, US government, computers and IT, and English grammar. All these categories are conveniently lobbed into one (except English grammar which has its own reading and response section) which makes it only mildly less daunting. Two other phases are incorporated into the tests which are a 30 min opinion essay and a psychology questionnaire. The essay is similar to those found in graduate program entry exams such as the GMAT or GRE, and are more a demonstration of your ability to compose an intelligent response in a short period of time versus your actual opinion on something. The psychology questions ask your friends’ opinions of yourself (which I personally find odd because I rarely ask my friends how they feel I handle various situations). They also ask for short responses to basic interview questions like: “list your previous jobs where answering the phone was an important task and how you handled this,” only the kicker was one had to do so in 200 characters or less; basically in two sentences.
So, I practiced all of that for 4 days. And by the end of the last day I felt burnt out, and admittedly stressed. Not that there was any need to be. The test is free to take (you’re only charged if you don’t show up) and since I still have a year and a half of Peace Corps service left, there is no rush. So why then am I doing this now? …Because if I don’t pass the test I can retake it- but not for another full year. And since the entire application process can take around a year (assuming I pass everything first time around- because if I don’t I’ll have to start all over again from scratch the next year) I figured I might as well get started now to maximize my time.
Anyway, test time came and apparently I and two other Peace Corps Volunteers were the only interested parties. So we sat at computer terminals in a training facility located next to the US embassy in downtown Dakar for 3 hours of fun. I’d heard a lot about how hard the exam is… but I didn’t necessarily agree. Perhaps I did a good job of studying. Perhaps I’m more intelligent than I give myself credit for. Either way, I walked out with a good feeling. Sure, I got a few questions wrong (was there really an upside to Pearl Harbor? Debatable) and I could’ve used 3 more minutes on my essay, but overall a good performance on my part.
Next up… waiting. I won’t know the results of my test for about 3 weeks. So let’s all cross our fingers that Uncle Sam gives me a stellar birthday present (3 weeks lands us very near July 2nd). My friends in town have all said they’ve prayed for me… though I’m sure they assumed I would be automatically assigned the US embassy in Senegal (I’ll have to explain it later, I’m sure, but why ruin a good thing now?). In any case, I’ll take what I can get as this story seems far from over.
To be in the Foreign Service means to be an officer of the US State Department. This is the type of job you get in order to work the US embassies around the world. As I understand it, the job rotates countries of assignment every two years and comes with fun list of benefits including: ample vacation time and allowances, housing and health care completely covered, free shipping of my possessions around the world, and access to language and culture instruction. But anyone who really knows me understands that the ability to change countries every so often without having to go through the hell finding a job- well that’s the attraction.
There are 5 different departments within the ranks of Foreign Service: the consular, public diplomacy, economic, political, and management. I can attempt to provide a basic description as I get them, but I probably won’t do them justice. A consular officer works with the Americans abroad as well as VISA applications and fraud. Public diplomacy officers work like the PR department promoting the US and its culture, whilst learning the culture of the host country. Economics officers study the host economy happenings and provide linkages between entrepreneurs foreign and domestic. Political officers do just as one would imagine, schmooze with important people and spread the word of America. And management officers, the path I’ve personally chosen, operate as though the embassy was its own corporation with functions of human resources, finance and accounting, purchasing and contracts, etc.
From the get-go one has to choose their department, or cone as the lingo goes. I picked management because it’s what comes naturally, what I enjoy doing, and generally (I’m told) what I’m good at. A little background never hurt anyone either. It is worth mentioning that I did have strong interests in both the economics and public diplomacy cones. Economics because of my degree and general love of business opportunities (hello, small enterprise development volunteer…) and public diplomacy because I do so much enjoy planning events and explaining why Americans are the way they are. But alas, I have to follow my niche. It helps to hear that one can apparently take a sabbatical on occasion to work outside their chosen cone for a rotation.
Now that I’ve chosen a hypothetical career path, it’s on to the actual application. The process, like most government jobs, is a doozey. First up is a 3 hour long test. Depending on the results (a simple pass/ fail is all you’ll hear) they’ll ask you to write some personal essays. If you happen to speak a language deemed critical (Chinese, Arabic, etc) then someone will call you for an over the phone language test. The results of your test, essays, and language are sent to a panel for judgment; probably something like an HR review meeting after a first round of interviews. If you advance from this stage, it’s on to an oral exam done in a group setting with other contestants and a judgment panel in DC. They say this is the hardest part as many have not survived this round. Though if you do, you’re almost done, for all your scores are combined and you’re plopped onto a hiring list. Then one waits to be called up to service. And once you are, or maybe before, there are a few weeks of orientation and training in DC before heading out to your lucky embassy. I’m told your first few rotations are probationary… but soon enough one can earn tenure and enjoy the jet setting ex-pat life for a long time. Ah… to be so lucky.
Ok, before I get too ahead of myself in day dreams, I’m still back at the beginning. Preparation for the test was only mildly hindered by my current location. Realizing my 6 brothers are a constant distraction, I excused myself to Dakar for 4 days of study either pool side- catching some rays- or in the air conditioned office. Things could’ve been worse.
I did quite a few practice exams with multiple subjects as the exam is a scattering of knowledge: world history and geography, US culture, mathematics, communications, US history, US government, computers and IT, and English grammar. All these categories are conveniently lobbed into one (except English grammar which has its own reading and response section) which makes it only mildly less daunting. Two other phases are incorporated into the tests which are a 30 min opinion essay and a psychology questionnaire. The essay is similar to those found in graduate program entry exams such as the GMAT or GRE, and are more a demonstration of your ability to compose an intelligent response in a short period of time versus your actual opinion on something. The psychology questions ask your friends’ opinions of yourself (which I personally find odd because I rarely ask my friends how they feel I handle various situations). They also ask for short responses to basic interview questions like: “list your previous jobs where answering the phone was an important task and how you handled this,” only the kicker was one had to do so in 200 characters or less; basically in two sentences.
So, I practiced all of that for 4 days. And by the end of the last day I felt burnt out, and admittedly stressed. Not that there was any need to be. The test is free to take (you’re only charged if you don’t show up) and since I still have a year and a half of Peace Corps service left, there is no rush. So why then am I doing this now? …Because if I don’t pass the test I can retake it- but not for another full year. And since the entire application process can take around a year (assuming I pass everything first time around- because if I don’t I’ll have to start all over again from scratch the next year) I figured I might as well get started now to maximize my time.
Anyway, test time came and apparently I and two other Peace Corps Volunteers were the only interested parties. So we sat at computer terminals in a training facility located next to the US embassy in downtown Dakar for 3 hours of fun. I’d heard a lot about how hard the exam is… but I didn’t necessarily agree. Perhaps I did a good job of studying. Perhaps I’m more intelligent than I give myself credit for. Either way, I walked out with a good feeling. Sure, I got a few questions wrong (was there really an upside to Pearl Harbor? Debatable) and I could’ve used 3 more minutes on my essay, but overall a good performance on my part.
Next up… waiting. I won’t know the results of my test for about 3 weeks. So let’s all cross our fingers that Uncle Sam gives me a stellar birthday present (3 weeks lands us very near July 2nd). My friends in town have all said they’ve prayed for me… though I’m sure they assumed I would be automatically assigned the US embassy in Senegal (I’ll have to explain it later, I’m sure, but why ruin a good thing now?). In any case, I’ll take what I can get as this story seems far from over.
Sunday, June 13
Accessories
I can’t help but notice how important dress is in African culture. There are similarities and difference between Senegal and the States. For instance: accessories must match, if you go to a meeting you dress to impress, and ironing is important enough to pay someone to do it for you. But unlike the US: one’s Sunday best and casual Friday attires have traded places- as Friday is the big prier day, wearing a bra is never mandatory, and anything less than full length can be a scandal.
Another interesting contrast is that I may wear an article three times before washing it over the course of a few weeks or maybe a month. But here, in Senegal, the people wear the same outfit three days in a row, then wash it and move on to the next one. The concept is the same (conserve water and usage of the clothing, right?) but the effect is wildly different. Or at least it was, until I got the hang of it. Seriously reduces need for thought in the morning, as well as for sorting through all my laundry trying to figure out what I can still wear.
As much as I try to “blend,” and just as I did in the states, I think about my style when I shop. My purchases seem to reflect me: the colors I prefer, the patterns I like, the style of cut. Part of keeping my identity is to blend African fabrics with western style cloths. This isn’t new to the Peace Corps world. We all do it. And this isn’t even the point of this story… because for the most part my family and friends in town don’t seem to mind much what I wear. And hey, not every day can be a fashion show. The people here will compliment me when I wear a nice dress (actually, they ask me to give the dress to them- but that’s just their way). And they pay way too much attention to me on the rare occasions when I do wear traditional clothing, but other than that they leave me alone. That is until my mom couldn’t take it anymore…
I brought two purses over from the States. The smaller being officially in the “going out” classification to be used only on those occasions when hair can be done and make up worn. The latter is a large bag I use every day, to carry everything from money to sun block to my computer, around town or on trips to other cities. It is made of fake red leather.
I’ve developed a relationship with the guy in town that works with leather. I’ve seen him make shoes, belts, smaller bags… and I’ve even commissioned a copy of my J Crew magic wallet (and instant success among PCVs). So, I’ve been talking to him for a while about copying my fake bag into a new and fabulous real leather one. He was all for the challenge. My plan was to give him the actual bag to use as a copy (can’t go wrong with that, right?) but I couldn’t do that until the next quarterly stipend came in (at the end of May) so I told him I’d have find something else to carry all my possessions before giving him the bag.
By June my red bag had weathered almost 10 months in the sand (not to mention the year or so I’d been using it in normal weather) and was basically a fashion embarrassment- though people were kind enough not to mention it. And on the very day that I was finally ready to take the original to my friend, I packed a small reusable shopping bag to carry my things back home, and headed for the door before my host mom stopped me. “Soda,” she says, “That bag…” She just lets the phrase hang out there. I knew what she was getting at. The look of sadness and disappointment said it was way past time to retire the thing and I got the impression I would embarrass her by continuing on with it. “I know, Anna. It has died.” She laughs, and I explain that I’m actually on the way to the market to get a new one made. I show her my shopping sack and she laughs again. “I will loan you my bag.”
When I come back from the market she sends one of my brothers in with the purse she’d been using all week. I accept it, graciously, and load up all my possessions… It’s a nice white bag that matches almost everything in my African closet (where as the red disaster probably didn’t match anything, but was the most functional thing I could’ve brought). Later in the week, it’s clear that my new bag will take a few weeks to produce and that I have to head out to Dakar for a long weekend. I approach my mom to tell her I’m going and offer to give the bag back… in case she wants to use it during the weekend. She laughs yet again. “Soda, I have many bags. You’re not going to be interrupting my wardrobe.”
How did this happen? When did I become the type of girl who only has one bag? And I let it get to a point of utter uncoordinated embarrassment. Fashionable friends who read this, I’m sorry. I suppose my excuses include a lack of space to house a collection of accessories, or the desire to spend my meager stipend on other things like cold beer and non-Senegalese food. But we can all rest easy in the knowledge that a new bag is on the way. It will be an inexpensive (a mere $40) brown leather work of art that will probably match nearly everything in my drawer of cloths. I imagine I’ll end up as the type of girl who only really needs ONE hell of a universal accessory. But just in case I’m not, there is an entire box of ‘em back in Michigan awaiting my reentry into the 1st world.
Another interesting contrast is that I may wear an article three times before washing it over the course of a few weeks or maybe a month. But here, in Senegal, the people wear the same outfit three days in a row, then wash it and move on to the next one. The concept is the same (conserve water and usage of the clothing, right?) but the effect is wildly different. Or at least it was, until I got the hang of it. Seriously reduces need for thought in the morning, as well as for sorting through all my laundry trying to figure out what I can still wear.
As much as I try to “blend,” and just as I did in the states, I think about my style when I shop. My purchases seem to reflect me: the colors I prefer, the patterns I like, the style of cut. Part of keeping my identity is to blend African fabrics with western style cloths. This isn’t new to the Peace Corps world. We all do it. And this isn’t even the point of this story… because for the most part my family and friends in town don’t seem to mind much what I wear. And hey, not every day can be a fashion show. The people here will compliment me when I wear a nice dress (actually, they ask me to give the dress to them- but that’s just their way). And they pay way too much attention to me on the rare occasions when I do wear traditional clothing, but other than that they leave me alone. That is until my mom couldn’t take it anymore…
I brought two purses over from the States. The smaller being officially in the “going out” classification to be used only on those occasions when hair can be done and make up worn. The latter is a large bag I use every day, to carry everything from money to sun block to my computer, around town or on trips to other cities. It is made of fake red leather.
I’ve developed a relationship with the guy in town that works with leather. I’ve seen him make shoes, belts, smaller bags… and I’ve even commissioned a copy of my J Crew magic wallet (and instant success among PCVs). So, I’ve been talking to him for a while about copying my fake bag into a new and fabulous real leather one. He was all for the challenge. My plan was to give him the actual bag to use as a copy (can’t go wrong with that, right?) but I couldn’t do that until the next quarterly stipend came in (at the end of May) so I told him I’d have find something else to carry all my possessions before giving him the bag.
By June my red bag had weathered almost 10 months in the sand (not to mention the year or so I’d been using it in normal weather) and was basically a fashion embarrassment- though people were kind enough not to mention it. And on the very day that I was finally ready to take the original to my friend, I packed a small reusable shopping bag to carry my things back home, and headed for the door before my host mom stopped me. “Soda,” she says, “That bag…” She just lets the phrase hang out there. I knew what she was getting at. The look of sadness and disappointment said it was way past time to retire the thing and I got the impression I would embarrass her by continuing on with it. “I know, Anna. It has died.” She laughs, and I explain that I’m actually on the way to the market to get a new one made. I show her my shopping sack and she laughs again. “I will loan you my bag.”
When I come back from the market she sends one of my brothers in with the purse she’d been using all week. I accept it, graciously, and load up all my possessions… It’s a nice white bag that matches almost everything in my African closet (where as the red disaster probably didn’t match anything, but was the most functional thing I could’ve brought). Later in the week, it’s clear that my new bag will take a few weeks to produce and that I have to head out to Dakar for a long weekend. I approach my mom to tell her I’m going and offer to give the bag back… in case she wants to use it during the weekend. She laughs yet again. “Soda, I have many bags. You’re not going to be interrupting my wardrobe.”
How did this happen? When did I become the type of girl who only has one bag? And I let it get to a point of utter uncoordinated embarrassment. Fashionable friends who read this, I’m sorry. I suppose my excuses include a lack of space to house a collection of accessories, or the desire to spend my meager stipend on other things like cold beer and non-Senegalese food. But we can all rest easy in the knowledge that a new bag is on the way. It will be an inexpensive (a mere $40) brown leather work of art that will probably match nearly everything in my drawer of cloths. I imagine I’ll end up as the type of girl who only really needs ONE hell of a universal accessory. But just in case I’m not, there is an entire box of ‘em back in Michigan awaiting my reentry into the 1st world.
Wednesday, June 9
Technology Wave
Growing up in the States, one could say we lived on the forefront of technology. New technologies were invented, tested, and eventually mass produced over decades. I remember my father talking about computers being invented, about how one used to fill an entire room and have less computing power and memory than the one pound tiny gizmo I’m typing on now.
But yet, when I was a kid I remember getting our first computer at home. And I remember in 6th grade class when typing (or keyboarding as we called it) became a mandatory class in school. Computer software classes were electives in 7th and 8th grade. By high school we used computers to write essays and finish other homework assignments. And somewhere in there the internet became a part of my world. I remember when my family first signed up for AOL and we all used one email account, because we didn’t know free ones existed. Back then it would take 5 minutes to load a web page, and we assumed that to be normal. By college, computer classes were mandatory, class notifications were dispersed by email, and I even took classes completely online- never once stepping into a classroom.
In the retrospective, the above describes about 10 years of my life. That’s pretty quick in the world of innovation. Think about how long it took the telephone to go from the days of Alexander Graham Bell to Apple’s iPhone; much more than 10 years. And from the first model T to the hybrid car.
What’s the point, and how does that relate to life in Africa? Well, from where I’m sitting there were some advantages to taking our time getting to know technology. For one, we got to work out all the kinks, learn from mistakes. And for another, over time we developed a set of standards or etiquette for our technologies. And I feel as though both of those key elements are lacking here in Senegal.
Let’s continue with the telephone example. The kinks I speak of include: live operators transferring to automatic dialing; no one home to answer the phone gets solved with answering machines and then voicemail; land lines to car phones, and then portables; miles of telephone cables changing to cellular towers; and then again to satellite; and quick conversations transmitted by beeper and then text message. The list goes on.
As for etiquette, there once was a time when there wasn’t a phone in every room and making a call was a big deal. People were excited to receive calls, were cordial and dropped everything. But as time went on and technology increased, novelty wore off and practicality took over. Now there is etiquette to follow: no calls during dinner or work place meetings. There are a few more etiquette rules to live by as well (as discussed in my previous posting), but the point is that we as Americans lived through all the changes in etiquette and can therefore appreciate why they exist and from where our social rules come.
By no means am I trying to say there isn’t an upside to being behind the technology curve. Where American soil is littered with telephone cables that I believe will be completely useless by the time my kids are my age, West Africa will have only cell towers- and a few of them at that as we transition to satellite communications. Thus their skyline will not be riddled with hideous metal poles and wires for devices no longer utilized.
Still though, I prefer to have lived my American life. With phone etiquette intact, you won’t hear my phone go off during a meeting and I promise to uphold other rules of etiquette.
But yet, when I was a kid I remember getting our first computer at home. And I remember in 6th grade class when typing (or keyboarding as we called it) became a mandatory class in school. Computer software classes were electives in 7th and 8th grade. By high school we used computers to write essays and finish other homework assignments. And somewhere in there the internet became a part of my world. I remember when my family first signed up for AOL and we all used one email account, because we didn’t know free ones existed. Back then it would take 5 minutes to load a web page, and we assumed that to be normal. By college, computer classes were mandatory, class notifications were dispersed by email, and I even took classes completely online- never once stepping into a classroom.
In the retrospective, the above describes about 10 years of my life. That’s pretty quick in the world of innovation. Think about how long it took the telephone to go from the days of Alexander Graham Bell to Apple’s iPhone; much more than 10 years. And from the first model T to the hybrid car.
What’s the point, and how does that relate to life in Africa? Well, from where I’m sitting there were some advantages to taking our time getting to know technology. For one, we got to work out all the kinks, learn from mistakes. And for another, over time we developed a set of standards or etiquette for our technologies. And I feel as though both of those key elements are lacking here in Senegal.
Let’s continue with the telephone example. The kinks I speak of include: live operators transferring to automatic dialing; no one home to answer the phone gets solved with answering machines and then voicemail; land lines to car phones, and then portables; miles of telephone cables changing to cellular towers; and then again to satellite; and quick conversations transmitted by beeper and then text message. The list goes on.
As for etiquette, there once was a time when there wasn’t a phone in every room and making a call was a big deal. People were excited to receive calls, were cordial and dropped everything. But as time went on and technology increased, novelty wore off and practicality took over. Now there is etiquette to follow: no calls during dinner or work place meetings. There are a few more etiquette rules to live by as well (as discussed in my previous posting), but the point is that we as Americans lived through all the changes in etiquette and can therefore appreciate why they exist and from where our social rules come.
By no means am I trying to say there isn’t an upside to being behind the technology curve. Where American soil is littered with telephone cables that I believe will be completely useless by the time my kids are my age, West Africa will have only cell towers- and a few of them at that as we transition to satellite communications. Thus their skyline will not be riddled with hideous metal poles and wires for devices no longer utilized.
Still though, I prefer to have lived my American life. With phone etiquette intact, you won’t hear my phone go off during a meeting and I promise to uphold other rules of etiquette.
Sunday, June 6
Phone Etiquette
It’s time to discuss the use of cell phones in Senegal. The device is basically the same. There are different versions of Nokia and Samsung products, with exceptions including the use of French language settings and the ability to utilize two different sim cards, from two different providers, simultaneously attached to the same device. Yes, this means there are two different send buttons when you wish to make a call. Which phone number/ sim card/ stock of credit do you wish to use for this call?
What’s lacking from this picture is the sense of phone etiquette. When someone calls, they barely greet you (in comparison to in person African culture where you will greet someone with no less than 2 minutes of formalities). There is no idle chit chat… conversations are directly to the point- almost insultingly- and then there is an abrupt disconnect and the call is over. Part of this could be the structure of the language, where there is no room for politeness or niceties. Senegalese rarely say please (I actually have no idea how to say that in Wolof) or thank you, and it took me months to learn how to say “you’re welcome” (and again I’m the only person I’ve ever heard use it). But the other reason for the abrupt nature is the cost of credit.
Phone credit is a staple, but not necessarily a cheap one. Where in the states a majority of the population uses calling plans in which we have a specified amount of contracted minutes (rounded up each time we burn them), Africa uses as prepaid method. You purchase the phone and the sim card, then you purchase small cards with which you reload your sim card with credit. CFA is purchased, loaded onto the sim card, and deducted based on seconds used for each phone call or 20 CFA for a text (100 CFA for international texts). Occasionally there is bonus day, where you receive 50% additional value of credit if you refill on that day. But I digress. Back to the issue of etiquette...
There is another whole topic of missed calls. At home, if that person was stored in my contact list, it means our relationship is such that I’d call them back. But if not, I’d just leave it. I’d operate under the guise that if it is important enough to the other party, they will call back. Here, it’s never a matter of importance… it’s about using phone credit. People will call, letting the phone ring once and then immediately hang up. They assume the person receiving the call has more phone credit (and money) and will happily call them back on their own dime (or CFA, if you will). Me, with my pretty white skin that says I’m made of money, I get a lot of these "beeps" as their called.
At first I didn’t want to let anyone down, so I'd call back the people whose numbers were stored in my phone. But generally, I found they were merely demonstrating to a friend or relative that they knew an American who couldn’t speak French or Wolof and was gullible enough to call back. Thus, I adopted the “they’ll call back” mantra. And it seems to work, the beeping has subsided. As time progresses I still get them from time to time, but people I communicate with regularly have had discussions with me about my version of phone etiquette.
First, I chose not to fight the lack long greetings because it’s generally uncomfortable to me anyway. But I did explain that it is rude to make someone else pay when you want to talk, so beeping is out of the question and I will not be responding to them. Ever. And that to call without a purpose is a waste of my time. I explain that if I’m in a meeting my phone is on vibrate so as not to disturb the flow of the meeting… and therefore I will not answer calls during said meeting either. Should my friends need me, but I haven’t answered the phone, they can text me the purpose of their call. I have no problems texting back, provided it does not interrupt the meeting. Or, if needed, I will return their call when I am free again. And lastly, I took the route of saying that it is impolite to abruptly hang up the call without warning. Perhaps the other party had more they wished to communicate… and thus more credit is wasted in calling back than waiting a few seconds to say goodbye. I also may have exaggerated in saying there is bad luck in not saying goodbye to someone. To not wish them a good day is to assure that something bad will happen to them on that day. And while this may not be entirely true, it does seem to have worked.
And now my friends and work partners call when they need something; we discuss it quickly and then say our goodbyes. They text when I am unreachable. And some of them have even caught on to the ease of texting the entire conversation. Say all you need to say in one quick note. Done. The Senegalese seem to respond well to the logic that texting uses less credit than a phone call. And since texting has caught on so well with my family, as a quick means of communicating where I'm going and when I'll be home, it was a huge relief when I was able to take it one step further and notify them of my whereabouts via Skype (Bamm! No credit necessary).
In conclusion, little by little I am leaving my mark on Senegal. Even if it's only one phone call at a time, the majority of my phone interactions have significantly improved in quality. And dare I say cost as well?
What’s lacking from this picture is the sense of phone etiquette. When someone calls, they barely greet you (in comparison to in person African culture where you will greet someone with no less than 2 minutes of formalities). There is no idle chit chat… conversations are directly to the point- almost insultingly- and then there is an abrupt disconnect and the call is over. Part of this could be the structure of the language, where there is no room for politeness or niceties. Senegalese rarely say please (I actually have no idea how to say that in Wolof) or thank you, and it took me months to learn how to say “you’re welcome” (and again I’m the only person I’ve ever heard use it). But the other reason for the abrupt nature is the cost of credit.
Phone credit is a staple, but not necessarily a cheap one. Where in the states a majority of the population uses calling plans in which we have a specified amount of contracted minutes (rounded up each time we burn them), Africa uses as prepaid method. You purchase the phone and the sim card, then you purchase small cards with which you reload your sim card with credit. CFA is purchased, loaded onto the sim card, and deducted based on seconds used for each phone call or 20 CFA for a text (100 CFA for international texts). Occasionally there is bonus day, where you receive 50% additional value of credit if you refill on that day. But I digress. Back to the issue of etiquette...
There is another whole topic of missed calls. At home, if that person was stored in my contact list, it means our relationship is such that I’d call them back. But if not, I’d just leave it. I’d operate under the guise that if it is important enough to the other party, they will call back. Here, it’s never a matter of importance… it’s about using phone credit. People will call, letting the phone ring once and then immediately hang up. They assume the person receiving the call has more phone credit (and money) and will happily call them back on their own dime (or CFA, if you will). Me, with my pretty white skin that says I’m made of money, I get a lot of these "beeps" as their called.
At first I didn’t want to let anyone down, so I'd call back the people whose numbers were stored in my phone. But generally, I found they were merely demonstrating to a friend or relative that they knew an American who couldn’t speak French or Wolof and was gullible enough to call back. Thus, I adopted the “they’ll call back” mantra. And it seems to work, the beeping has subsided. As time progresses I still get them from time to time, but people I communicate with regularly have had discussions with me about my version of phone etiquette.
First, I chose not to fight the lack long greetings because it’s generally uncomfortable to me anyway. But I did explain that it is rude to make someone else pay when you want to talk, so beeping is out of the question and I will not be responding to them. Ever. And that to call without a purpose is a waste of my time. I explain that if I’m in a meeting my phone is on vibrate so as not to disturb the flow of the meeting… and therefore I will not answer calls during said meeting either. Should my friends need me, but I haven’t answered the phone, they can text me the purpose of their call. I have no problems texting back, provided it does not interrupt the meeting. Or, if needed, I will return their call when I am free again. And lastly, I took the route of saying that it is impolite to abruptly hang up the call without warning. Perhaps the other party had more they wished to communicate… and thus more credit is wasted in calling back than waiting a few seconds to say goodbye. I also may have exaggerated in saying there is bad luck in not saying goodbye to someone. To not wish them a good day is to assure that something bad will happen to them on that day. And while this may not be entirely true, it does seem to have worked.
And now my friends and work partners call when they need something; we discuss it quickly and then say our goodbyes. They text when I am unreachable. And some of them have even caught on to the ease of texting the entire conversation. Say all you need to say in one quick note. Done. The Senegalese seem to respond well to the logic that texting uses less credit than a phone call. And since texting has caught on so well with my family, as a quick means of communicating where I'm going and when I'll be home, it was a huge relief when I was able to take it one step further and notify them of my whereabouts via Skype (Bamm! No credit necessary).
In conclusion, little by little I am leaving my mark on Senegal. Even if it's only one phone call at a time, the majority of my phone interactions have significantly improved in quality. And dare I say cost as well?
Wednesday, June 2
Pilgrimage
The annual catholic pilgrimage to Popenguine is quite the experience. I began my own pilgrimage on Saturday afternoon. I took the normal sept place to Thies and in doing so discovered a Pulaar man, who spoke no French and Wolof that seemed only slightly better than mine, also headed to Popenguine. At the garage in Thies, I would have normally gotten in another car to Mbour, which is a destination farther along the same route, and paid full price only to get out early and take a small taxi car to the beach. Instead, with help from the Pulaar man, I was escorted to another smaller garage, a ten minute walk through town, which hosted car rapides- like a large conversion van outfitted with too many bench seats to be comfortable- directly to the small town I would’ve gotten out at anyway. Doing this saved me 25% of the travel cost I was willing to pay. Score! It paid to be friendly with the elderly man, even though we couldn’t communicate. This would also serve as a sign to the light hearted atmosphere I was about to encounter during the event.
At the small road town of Sindia, I utilized a gendarme escort to cross the main road. Traffic was beginning to back up and people were crowding the streets looking for transportation to the beach. Even after crossing, a fight broke out and I found myself attempting to duck out of the way by jumping further into the street. It was nothing major, just a simple fight over open seats on another car rapide, and it was over in under a minute. At this point another kind person took notice and escorted me to a taxi with an open seat… and off to Popenguine we went.
In town, I utilized my knowledge of my previous visits to navigate through the hundreds of booths, tents and promotional stands that were half constructed to the far side of town where my friend was waiting for me at the bar with a cold beer. Relaxing and making future plans with his friend the tailor, we enjoyed our beers until it was time for dinner back at my friend’s house. We ate some truly amazing meal of chicken with veggies and just as we finished some mango slices for dessert another friend arrived in town. Back on the street we found grilled pork sandwiches and tried a new beer in Senegal called “33,” with a taste in between the current two- Gazelle (my favorite- like a light beer) and Flag (like a wheat beer). We continued to walk around town to checkout restaurant tents, watering holes, and promotional booths that we’d have to come back to the next day. The vendors of said booths were already fast asleep on the streets in blankets or tents made of rice sack bags.
We grabbed some fresh bottles of palm wine. It comes from the local palm trees (of which there are apparently many versions and I can’t tell you which gives wine and which gives dates, but I’ll get there someday). At first it takes like a sweet juice… but the longer it sits the more it ferments and before you know it a bitter tasting liquid is getting you very drunk very quickly. We took it to the beach, which I’m told is closed off for the weekend because people get drunk and end up trying to swim (when they apparently can’t) and drown. Somehow, we got down there for a moonlight gaze at the ocean. We continued to walk around the quiet, sleeping town and bought 3 more bottles of palm wine for the next day before calling it quits.
After a hot night’s sleep in my friends packed house (apparently every family member brought a handful of their friends for the event), it was back to the town to experience the pilgrimage. We started by hitting up the local cell phone company booth to look for free t-shirts (that would come “later”) and then quit pretending we weren't in it for the booze and found some beers. We pulled up plastic chairs and hung out with a view of the ocean and some cold drinks. People all around were still setting up for the fete. As afternoon came another friend arrived by car and we decided to grab some lunch; yassa pork and grilled pork. It felt great to eat pig again! We walked around some more, drank some more, and ate more sandwiches. In all honesty, it felt like tailgating. So naturally, we took a ‘post game’ nap. Upon waking up, we found that the walkers had started to arrive.
People walk from all over the area to Popenguine each year; arriving in packs from Dakar, the Delta region, and even from the north. The event is apparently well organized, as you pay an entry fee at your respective take off point which gets you a badge, free meals, transportation of your baggage, and tent space in Popenguine (Hello, Breast Cancer 3-day walk, are you hearing this? Senegal has organization skills. Think about it). The people walk because apparently a while back someone did this from Dakar to Popenguine and upon arriving saw the “Black Mary.” Yeah, I don’t know what that could possibly implicate, but as they found it an enjoyable experience so be it. The event has grown over the years so as to make necessary the following: organized walking (as described above), permanent infrastructure (in which to conduct mass for the masses), and even the printing of event t-shirts and other souvenirs. Port-o-potties (which I have never seen in country before this), massive amounts of pork and beer, and all the largest companies in country played a role in our entertainment.
We went to my friend’s favorite watering hole in the afternoon, sat on the roof (with more beer, is it possible?) and waited for our friends who were walking. Curiously, they were both female. Girls can walk farther than guys in Africa too? (Dearest 3-day organizers, seriously, are you listening to this?) We waited for the sun to set and started in on the sandwiches once again. We headed to the church and the market to view the merchandise… it is possible to purchase a glowing (even blinking- Vegas style) statue of the Virgin Mary. Score! One also found t-shirts proclaiming that “without Jesus there is no life,” and that Jesus wants you to “come to me.” They ran out of pink, so I choose to pass on purchasing one.
Later, we stopped by midnight mass. Thousands of people crowded under and around the cement pavilion built on top of a hill for this occasion. Multiple sets of sound systems were set up to broadcast someone I couldn’t actually locate. Mass was in French.
We went looking for a party, so headed to the beach once more, which was littered with couples doing things I didn’t care to investigate. Back during training we rented a house on the water and that night we wandered back to it. Apparently some people had rented it out, turned it into a club, and were open to a small group of white people crashing the party. Good times, with good music, until someone started throwing bottles and we got out quickly. And on the way home we got more sandwiches. Are you surprised?
The next day, it became clear there were too many people in the house as everyone went to shower in one bathroom. It was the first time I saw a squat toilet overflow. I have no idea how one fixes that (and I’m told it’s still a problem over a week later). People dressed to impress as they went to morning mass at 10a. More people than the night before attended the event. We couldn’t even get near the pavilion there were so many thousands of people. Someone had even organized the local boys/girls scouts to act as first aid… which we witnessed in action as they carried a passed out (probably dehydrated) pilgrim into a tent with a red cross on it. (3-day people, this is not your last chance, but come on!)
We walked around town some more checking out the souvenir merchandise and tasted a new promotional milk (it’s a big breakfast drink of choice). Mass went from 10 to lunch, then was to recommence until mid-afternoon. Intense, no? In an effort to beat the traffic, we left town around noon. Our final round of sandwiches was consumed as we hiked to the garage outside of town. There we negotiated a small taxi to drive us to Dakar (we were going for PC training the following day), and though he said he had to be back at a certain time, the driver was happy to oblige. Half way there, he decided he needed to turn around so he pulled over, bargained another taxi, paid the man, and helped us transfer to the new car… which drove us straight to the Peace Corps house. Best ride to Dakar by public transport I’ve ever had. And we even missed all the traffic! It was another awesome experience.
At the small road town of Sindia, I utilized a gendarme escort to cross the main road. Traffic was beginning to back up and people were crowding the streets looking for transportation to the beach. Even after crossing, a fight broke out and I found myself attempting to duck out of the way by jumping further into the street. It was nothing major, just a simple fight over open seats on another car rapide, and it was over in under a minute. At this point another kind person took notice and escorted me to a taxi with an open seat… and off to Popenguine we went.
In town, I utilized my knowledge of my previous visits to navigate through the hundreds of booths, tents and promotional stands that were half constructed to the far side of town where my friend was waiting for me at the bar with a cold beer. Relaxing and making future plans with his friend the tailor, we enjoyed our beers until it was time for dinner back at my friend’s house. We ate some truly amazing meal of chicken with veggies and just as we finished some mango slices for dessert another friend arrived in town. Back on the street we found grilled pork sandwiches and tried a new beer in Senegal called “33,” with a taste in between the current two- Gazelle (my favorite- like a light beer) and Flag (like a wheat beer). We continued to walk around town to checkout restaurant tents, watering holes, and promotional booths that we’d have to come back to the next day. The vendors of said booths were already fast asleep on the streets in blankets or tents made of rice sack bags.
We grabbed some fresh bottles of palm wine. It comes from the local palm trees (of which there are apparently many versions and I can’t tell you which gives wine and which gives dates, but I’ll get there someday). At first it takes like a sweet juice… but the longer it sits the more it ferments and before you know it a bitter tasting liquid is getting you very drunk very quickly. We took it to the beach, which I’m told is closed off for the weekend because people get drunk and end up trying to swim (when they apparently can’t) and drown. Somehow, we got down there for a moonlight gaze at the ocean. We continued to walk around the quiet, sleeping town and bought 3 more bottles of palm wine for the next day before calling it quits.
After a hot night’s sleep in my friends packed house (apparently every family member brought a handful of their friends for the event), it was back to the town to experience the pilgrimage. We started by hitting up the local cell phone company booth to look for free t-shirts (that would come “later”) and then quit pretending we weren't in it for the booze and found some beers. We pulled up plastic chairs and hung out with a view of the ocean and some cold drinks. People all around were still setting up for the fete. As afternoon came another friend arrived by car and we decided to grab some lunch; yassa pork and grilled pork. It felt great to eat pig again! We walked around some more, drank some more, and ate more sandwiches. In all honesty, it felt like tailgating. So naturally, we took a ‘post game’ nap. Upon waking up, we found that the walkers had started to arrive.
People walk from all over the area to Popenguine each year; arriving in packs from Dakar, the Delta region, and even from the north. The event is apparently well organized, as you pay an entry fee at your respective take off point which gets you a badge, free meals, transportation of your baggage, and tent space in Popenguine (Hello, Breast Cancer 3-day walk, are you hearing this? Senegal has organization skills. Think about it). The people walk because apparently a while back someone did this from Dakar to Popenguine and upon arriving saw the “Black Mary.” Yeah, I don’t know what that could possibly implicate, but as they found it an enjoyable experience so be it. The event has grown over the years so as to make necessary the following: organized walking (as described above), permanent infrastructure (in which to conduct mass for the masses), and even the printing of event t-shirts and other souvenirs. Port-o-potties (which I have never seen in country before this), massive amounts of pork and beer, and all the largest companies in country played a role in our entertainment.
We went to my friend’s favorite watering hole in the afternoon, sat on the roof (with more beer, is it possible?) and waited for our friends who were walking. Curiously, they were both female. Girls can walk farther than guys in Africa too? (Dearest 3-day organizers, seriously, are you listening to this?) We waited for the sun to set and started in on the sandwiches once again. We headed to the church and the market to view the merchandise… it is possible to purchase a glowing (even blinking- Vegas style) statue of the Virgin Mary. Score! One also found t-shirts proclaiming that “without Jesus there is no life,” and that Jesus wants you to “come to me.” They ran out of pink, so I choose to pass on purchasing one.
Later, we stopped by midnight mass. Thousands of people crowded under and around the cement pavilion built on top of a hill for this occasion. Multiple sets of sound systems were set up to broadcast someone I couldn’t actually locate. Mass was in French.
We went looking for a party, so headed to the beach once more, which was littered with couples doing things I didn’t care to investigate. Back during training we rented a house on the water and that night we wandered back to it. Apparently some people had rented it out, turned it into a club, and were open to a small group of white people crashing the party. Good times, with good music, until someone started throwing bottles and we got out quickly. And on the way home we got more sandwiches. Are you surprised?
The next day, it became clear there were too many people in the house as everyone went to shower in one bathroom. It was the first time I saw a squat toilet overflow. I have no idea how one fixes that (and I’m told it’s still a problem over a week later). People dressed to impress as they went to morning mass at 10a. More people than the night before attended the event. We couldn’t even get near the pavilion there were so many thousands of people. Someone had even organized the local boys/girls scouts to act as first aid… which we witnessed in action as they carried a passed out (probably dehydrated) pilgrim into a tent with a red cross on it. (3-day people, this is not your last chance, but come on!)
We walked around town some more checking out the souvenir merchandise and tasted a new promotional milk (it’s a big breakfast drink of choice). Mass went from 10 to lunch, then was to recommence until mid-afternoon. Intense, no? In an effort to beat the traffic, we left town around noon. Our final round of sandwiches was consumed as we hiked to the garage outside of town. There we negotiated a small taxi to drive us to Dakar (we were going for PC training the following day), and though he said he had to be back at a certain time, the driver was happy to oblige. Half way there, he decided he needed to turn around so he pulled over, bargained another taxi, paid the man, and helped us transfer to the new car… which drove us straight to the Peace Corps house. Best ride to Dakar by public transport I’ve ever had. And we even missed all the traffic! It was another awesome experience.
Sunday, May 30
Fun (Unsubstantiated) Tourism Facts
Facts I learned in Eco-Tourism Conference this past week. They were given by various departments of the Senegalese government, though we don't know how the information was collected and if any of it can be substantiated.
1) 800,000 potential tourists entered Senegal last year but only 34% spend the night.
2) 90% of tourists to Africa go to the Northern, Eastern, and Southern regions. 10% of tourists go to the Western and Central regions.
3) 50% of tourists come to Senegal for the beach.
4) 30% of tourists stay in Dakar; 30% stay in Thies.
5) Senegal plans to have capacity for over 2,000,000 visitors by 2020. 1,500,000 by 2015.
6) Tourism grows by 5% a year, but eco-tourism grows by 20 -34% a year.
7) Hotels are currently at 35% bed capacity now but expansion of hotels and resorts, etc continues in Senegal. Break even is at 30% bed capacity.
8) Bed capacity is a unit of measuring that comes from African culture of sharing everything. (Americans rent by the room, and then fill rooms). Rooms are rented by person by night, though you will get your own room if travelling alone.
9) 481 guides in Senegal have official government certification to be a guide.
10) 10 types of eco-tourism certifications exists for the lodging industry; 3 unique to Africa.
1) 800,000 potential tourists entered Senegal last year but only 34% spend the night.
2) 90% of tourists to Africa go to the Northern, Eastern, and Southern regions. 10% of tourists go to the Western and Central regions.
3) 50% of tourists come to Senegal for the beach.
4) 30% of tourists stay in Dakar; 30% stay in Thies.
5) Senegal plans to have capacity for over 2,000,000 visitors by 2020. 1,500,000 by 2015.
6) Tourism grows by 5% a year, but eco-tourism grows by 20 -34% a year.
7) Hotels are currently at 35% bed capacity now but expansion of hotels and resorts, etc continues in Senegal. Break even is at 30% bed capacity.
8) Bed capacity is a unit of measuring that comes from African culture of sharing everything. (Americans rent by the room, and then fill rooms). Rooms are rented by person by night, though you will get your own room if travelling alone.
9) 481 guides in Senegal have official government certification to be a guide.
10) 10 types of eco-tourism certifications exists for the lodging industry; 3 unique to Africa.
Wednesday, May 26
The Day The Music Died
Someone once asked me what I was most afraid of. I remember that I was far from home, traveling with my sister, and asked by a friend of a friend that I barely knew. I had never given much thought this; more serious people would probably say death or failure. And without thinking about it, just knowing it to be true, I replied that my biggest fear was a lack of good music.
Death and failure are certain. Their magnitude and exact moments may not be, but they themselves are inevitable. I know I will die one day. This is why I have legal documents drafted. And why I often tell my family and friends how I care for them. I also know that I will fail. I will fail to do well on a test, or fail to get a job. I will fail at a match of tennis, and I will fail to always please my father. But I’m sure that all the times I fail, I will pick myself up again and go on to do bigger and better things. Understand these certainties, do the best you can to work with them, but don’t bother being afraid.
So I fear a lack of music; the day the music died. Not the supposed day of a plane crash killing musicians Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper, as Don MacLean’s “American Pie” leads one to believe. I fear the day when I turn on the radio and can’t find a single station playing a single song I can appreciate. Without something enjoyable, the silence seems unbearably scary.
I think about how some of the most important things I’ve done with my life have been accompanied by my own mental sound track. When I spent a summer in California… I think of John Mayer driving on the highway. I think of not having a single picture from that summer because of the song 3x5. I think about his August concert at UC Berkley; the feel of the concrete stadium seats. I think of my favorite quote “Everybody is just a stranger, but that’s the danger in going my own way…”
When I spent a semester in Italy… I think of Linkin Park on a crowded bus where the old lady is surprised equally by the harshness of the music overflowing from my ears and my act of kindness in offering her my seat another language. Perhaps I’m just as surprised? Or walking the streets at night past unbelievable monuments listening to a playlist I’d made for a boyfriend long gone away, knowing that both the sites and the boy would be forever imprinted in my mind.
But it’s not just the big stepping stones. It’s the holidays and everydays. When I hear Taps, I remember the trumpets, piloted by friends, emanating from various locations in the cemetery on Memorial Day. I remember the grey clouds in the sky. And I feel the starch in my marching uniform. I feel sorrow for my long gone grandfather. Then there are the lyrics that, when heard, will transport me to a moment in time where I see someone else enjoying a birthday party, a special dinner, an afternoon in the car, a dance at prom…
And for every moment I can remember, there are so many more that are just barely forgotten. I know that throughout my life there have been so many countless moments where I was overcome with feeling because of a song. Or, even better, I was affected some other life stimulant… and became utterly content to find a song that perfectly matched that feeling.
But it isn’t just about the past. When I applied to Peace Corps, I kept telling them that music was my coping mechanism. “And, what else?” they’d say. I get that it’s not an end all- cure all but it’s a very powerful tool to have in the repertoire. When culture clashes, insects and reptiles, food, and heat threaten my inner cool… I resort to my headphones. When the states, my family and friends, and my previous life feels too far away to be real… I resort to my headphones. And it helps.
Music, a perfectly matched song, is like a companion; my best friend. When I am happy, it will share my enthusiasm. When I am alone, we are alone together. When I am angry, music will drum the anger away. When I am sad, it will compel me to pick myself up and sway. For every difficulty that I face, no matter where I rest my head on this earth, I know that music will follow. Or at least I can bring my headphones with me.
I suppose this means I'm not really afraid of anything... but I doubt that.
Death and failure are certain. Their magnitude and exact moments may not be, but they themselves are inevitable. I know I will die one day. This is why I have legal documents drafted. And why I often tell my family and friends how I care for them. I also know that I will fail. I will fail to do well on a test, or fail to get a job. I will fail at a match of tennis, and I will fail to always please my father. But I’m sure that all the times I fail, I will pick myself up again and go on to do bigger and better things. Understand these certainties, do the best you can to work with them, but don’t bother being afraid.
So I fear a lack of music; the day the music died. Not the supposed day of a plane crash killing musicians Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper, as Don MacLean’s “American Pie” leads one to believe. I fear the day when I turn on the radio and can’t find a single station playing a single song I can appreciate. Without something enjoyable, the silence seems unbearably scary.
I think about how some of the most important things I’ve done with my life have been accompanied by my own mental sound track. When I spent a summer in California… I think of John Mayer driving on the highway. I think of not having a single picture from that summer because of the song 3x5. I think about his August concert at UC Berkley; the feel of the concrete stadium seats. I think of my favorite quote “Everybody is just a stranger, but that’s the danger in going my own way…”
When I spent a semester in Italy… I think of Linkin Park on a crowded bus where the old lady is surprised equally by the harshness of the music overflowing from my ears and my act of kindness in offering her my seat another language. Perhaps I’m just as surprised? Or walking the streets at night past unbelievable monuments listening to a playlist I’d made for a boyfriend long gone away, knowing that both the sites and the boy would be forever imprinted in my mind.
But it’s not just the big stepping stones. It’s the holidays and everydays. When I hear Taps, I remember the trumpets, piloted by friends, emanating from various locations in the cemetery on Memorial Day. I remember the grey clouds in the sky. And I feel the starch in my marching uniform. I feel sorrow for my long gone grandfather. Then there are the lyrics that, when heard, will transport me to a moment in time where I see someone else enjoying a birthday party, a special dinner, an afternoon in the car, a dance at prom…
And for every moment I can remember, there are so many more that are just barely forgotten. I know that throughout my life there have been so many countless moments where I was overcome with feeling because of a song. Or, even better, I was affected some other life stimulant… and became utterly content to find a song that perfectly matched that feeling.
But it isn’t just about the past. When I applied to Peace Corps, I kept telling them that music was my coping mechanism. “And, what else?” they’d say. I get that it’s not an end all- cure all but it’s a very powerful tool to have in the repertoire. When culture clashes, insects and reptiles, food, and heat threaten my inner cool… I resort to my headphones. When the states, my family and friends, and my previous life feels too far away to be real… I resort to my headphones. And it helps.
Music, a perfectly matched song, is like a companion; my best friend. When I am happy, it will share my enthusiasm. When I am alone, we are alone together. When I am angry, music will drum the anger away. When I am sad, it will compel me to pick myself up and sway. For every difficulty that I face, no matter where I rest my head on this earth, I know that music will follow. Or at least I can bring my headphones with me.
I suppose this means I'm not really afraid of anything... but I doubt that.
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