Book: Still on “The Fountainhead” by far one of the best books I have ever read. If you have read it you know what I am talking about.
Song:
So this is a special report about my Tabaski. Since most people don’t know about it I figured I will tell you about my day. It started at 10 when my father and brothers got back from the mosque. They took about 7 knives and dug a whole in the ground. We got the family together and put the got onto the ground next to the whole. I was watching and then they told me to come over because I needed to help. At this point I felt as if I just wanted to watch and not really take part of the Tabaski sacrifice. I knelt down at the rear of the goat and put all of my weight down on the struggling animal. I looked up at the animal struggling and looked back down at the goats torso and saw it urinating all over the ground in front of me. Then I looked up and blood was flowing from the neck. My stomach felt like a hollow well. After the throat was slit I had to hang on because the body was twitching and I could feel every single breath rumbling out of the body. I would hqve to put this up with one of the most intense moments of my life.
After the animal was done twitching I was able to get up and then they skinned and dissected the animal. After we cut the animal up we started a BBQ and ate some good meat. After the BBQ we had breakfast which was meat with onions and mustard. A few hours later we ate boiled, deep fried goat with bread. Then for dinner we ate more boiled sheep. For breakfast the next day we ate a oil based soup with the brains, intestines, heart, and the stomach lining. It didn’t taste to bad, but I didn’t eat much since I was able to identify each part of the insides.
After we ate lunch we hung around and got our outfits on and went to other people’s houses. I visited my counterparts house and ate fried goat which was a little furry and dry. I had orange soda with it, which made it all the better. After that I went back home and made my first pot of tea ever. I didn it and the first round wasn’t very good but the second round was excellent. For those of you who don’t know about Senegales tea, it is a long process which takes along time to make the tea. There is a special pouring technique thqt is necesairy to get a special formation of foam on the top of the glass. I spilled all over my self but now can make a descent glass. All of my hard work has paid off. That was a quick view of my Tabaski. I also went to a few dances at night in Dagana, but didn’t have too much fun. Every one was starring at me and pointing and laughing so that didn’t make me to happy. I still busted a move on the dance floor and my bollacast dancing is getting better. My brothers have been home a lot also so I am starting tio get to know a lot of the people who live in Dagana and I can’t leave the house without someone calling me over to speak to them. I never know who they are but they tell me that they know me and we meet the other day. It is hard to remember everyones name when you meet atleast 15 new people a day. Any who just wanted to say hi and hope everyone has a merry Xmas.
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Longest day yet
Book: Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
Song: The Way I Are by Timberland. Senegalese people love it, and I brought it.
5 ways I get woken up every day.
1: My alarm clock (Lame)
2: Children beating against my window yelling at me.
3: Goats, sheep, donkeys, and Roosters.
4: Some one banging the broom against my door while they sweep.
5: Host mom having long conversations at 6 am outside my window.
Any who, life is going here. I just recently had the busiest day ever in Senegal. I woke up at 9, which is kind of late for me, but I find it to be perfect. Woke up ate some bread with mustard on it. Had a quick little work out then showered. I was out of my house by 9:45 to go to the center of formation for women. I got their a little early greeted everyone there than realized the guy I was supposed to meet up with was probably still sleeping even though we made plans to meet at 10. It happened to me the day before also so it wasn’t a big surprise. I decided to walk back home when I ran into my cousin who was on her way to the market to buy lunch and dinner. I decided to join her on the walk that was over a k away. We went to the market, but before we could buy anything we had to return her hair extensions, which was impossible because, there are no recites and she went into every store asking that they take them back and give her the money back. Here are a few reasons no one gave her a refund. She tried returning it to stores she didn’t buy them from. She said she didn’t know which store she had bought it from. Second of all she just asks for money back and she comes up with an arbitrary number. Third no one is going to give you money three days before the big holiday in Senegal. Tabaski you buy new clothes for the family, kill a goat for dinner, and the whole family gets together. No one is going to give you money back. So after a half hour of wondering we go to the market and buy vegetables and fish for dinner. A quick description of the market; hundreds of women pushing to get to the vendors. It is like a farmers market in the US with everyone sitting on the floor and everything is sandy. So as I was getting pushed around a lady grabbed my arm, so I turn around like what the, and it was my counterpart. So she drags me away from the crowd and tells me to go find her house. She lives near the pharmacy and just ask there for her house. So after that brief interaction where she would only speak English because she wants to improve her English. (I only understood half of it.) I turn around and realize I can’t see my cousin anywhere. I go back into the market and finally find her at s stand buying beesap. We grab the basket and on the way back she stops in each store to sell back her extensions. At the end of the market we jump into a taxi, which consists of a two-wheel cart and an emaciated horse on the end of it. So we get a ride home, but I hate ridding in these taxis because the horses get beaten pretty good and for some reason the guy said he wanted to impress the American by beating the horse to a full gallop. Any who we get home and I walk straight back to the Center to meet my friend. We meet up and I use the free internet. Yes I said that. Free internet. When he finished his work we went to his house around 12. He lives past the marche (market) so it was a long walk. After we arrive we sat in his room from 12 to 3 just looking at photographs and discussing various things. That is what you do in Senegal. You put in your time and relax and that is how you build relationships. Every Senegalese person has a packet of photographs they will bring out when someone visits. Photos here are like gold and every house I go to people show me pictures. And the pictures are generally people standing straight not smiling. It is great. Donc at three we ate lunch, which was awkward because the uncle stared at me the whole time, which made me really uncomfortable. After lunch I hung out until 4 then went home took a shower left by 4:30 walked to my counterparts house where the family mostly only speaks Wolof. I spoke to my counterpart while she died her fingers and feet red. Kind of weird. We decided that tomorrow I would come by for a big lunch and spend the day together. She also told me that when people ask who my mother is that I say she was my mother. Kind of weird, but hey I can dig all of the love, only a foreigner can get. So I get home at 6:30 and just relax. I went to bed at 9:30 and am now typing this message. So that was Djiby’s day of craziness.
Song: The Way I Are by Timberland. Senegalese people love it, and I brought it.
5 ways I get woken up every day.
1: My alarm clock (Lame)
2: Children beating against my window yelling at me.
3: Goats, sheep, donkeys, and Roosters.
4: Some one banging the broom against my door while they sweep.
5: Host mom having long conversations at 6 am outside my window.
Any who, life is going here. I just recently had the busiest day ever in Senegal. I woke up at 9, which is kind of late for me, but I find it to be perfect. Woke up ate some bread with mustard on it. Had a quick little work out then showered. I was out of my house by 9:45 to go to the center of formation for women. I got their a little early greeted everyone there than realized the guy I was supposed to meet up with was probably still sleeping even though we made plans to meet at 10. It happened to me the day before also so it wasn’t a big surprise. I decided to walk back home when I ran into my cousin who was on her way to the market to buy lunch and dinner. I decided to join her on the walk that was over a k away. We went to the market, but before we could buy anything we had to return her hair extensions, which was impossible because, there are no recites and she went into every store asking that they take them back and give her the money back. Here are a few reasons no one gave her a refund. She tried returning it to stores she didn’t buy them from. She said she didn’t know which store she had bought it from. Second of all she just asks for money back and she comes up with an arbitrary number. Third no one is going to give you money three days before the big holiday in Senegal. Tabaski you buy new clothes for the family, kill a goat for dinner, and the whole family gets together. No one is going to give you money back. So after a half hour of wondering we go to the market and buy vegetables and fish for dinner. A quick description of the market; hundreds of women pushing to get to the vendors. It is like a farmers market in the US with everyone sitting on the floor and everything is sandy. So as I was getting pushed around a lady grabbed my arm, so I turn around like what the, and it was my counterpart. So she drags me away from the crowd and tells me to go find her house. She lives near the pharmacy and just ask there for her house. So after that brief interaction where she would only speak English because she wants to improve her English. (I only understood half of it.) I turn around and realize I can’t see my cousin anywhere. I go back into the market and finally find her at s stand buying beesap. We grab the basket and on the way back she stops in each store to sell back her extensions. At the end of the market we jump into a taxi, which consists of a two-wheel cart and an emaciated horse on the end of it. So we get a ride home, but I hate ridding in these taxis because the horses get beaten pretty good and for some reason the guy said he wanted to impress the American by beating the horse to a full gallop. Any who we get home and I walk straight back to the Center to meet my friend. We meet up and I use the free internet. Yes I said that. Free internet. When he finished his work we went to his house around 12. He lives past the marche (market) so it was a long walk. After we arrive we sat in his room from 12 to 3 just looking at photographs and discussing various things. That is what you do in Senegal. You put in your time and relax and that is how you build relationships. Every Senegalese person has a packet of photographs they will bring out when someone visits. Photos here are like gold and every house I go to people show me pictures. And the pictures are generally people standing straight not smiling. It is great. Donc at three we ate lunch, which was awkward because the uncle stared at me the whole time, which made me really uncomfortable. After lunch I hung out until 4 then went home took a shower left by 4:30 walked to my counterparts house where the family mostly only speaks Wolof. I spoke to my counterpart while she died her fingers and feet red. Kind of weird. We decided that tomorrow I would come by for a big lunch and spend the day together. She also told me that when people ask who my mother is that I say she was my mother. Kind of weird, but hey I can dig all of the love, only a foreigner can get. So I get home at 6:30 and just relax. I went to bed at 9:30 and am now typing this message. So that was Djiby’s day of craziness.
Friday, December 14, 2007
Dagana oh Dagana
Book: The Chosen by Chaim Potok,
A Million Little Pieces,
The Book of Guys,
The Discomfort Zone by Jonathan Franzen
and my French book is Ma Babouche Pour Toujours. (Don’t ask me what that means. I still need a dictioinary.) Alisa I think that you would really like “The Chosen” if you haven’t read it and Lea you will also like it, but only if you follow through with Birth Right.
Song: Since Your Gone, Josh Ritter. It makes me laugh. Thanks Katie!
Ten ways you know you are in Senegal.
10: You feel like you have accomplished something if you leave the house and have a conversation.
9: You see a concave of trucks everyday with loud speakers cruising the streets. Sometimes they yell about the President, play music, or promote a phone company.
8: You only have the option to buy one product because there is only one company that makes the product.
7: You pay the hotel by the hour. (Hotels are popular in factory towns.)
6: You know you really shouldn’t jump in the river and swim because of shisto, but decide to do it anyways.
5: You see a large truck where the entire side is open and has pictures of soup cubes and there are over a hundred women with their yellow buckets clapping to the music waqiting for free soup cubes.
4: You hear someone say that Djiby is a good dancer. He dance Senegalese.
3: You get a thorn stuck in your foot every other step.
2: You walk into all the women in the family sitting in a semi circle two feet away from the TV watching Spanish soap operas and yelling at the TV.
1: You get to sit on the same stage as the presidents wife just because you wonder on it and no one says anything to you. Yeah I’m a celebrity in Senegal. On the news and everything.
Which is a good intro to my story. We will call it Djibi’s crazy day in Richard Toll. So a few days ago I get a text message from my neighbor to the West to come to Toll and meet the President’s wife. She will be talking about AIDs and prevention. I say well I will think about it and see what I have planned on that day. Two days later I get another text saying, “Djiby, I got us an invite to a BBQ with the UN.” They work for the United Nations refugee program. When I hear this I say well I guess I can make an effort to come into town and do this. I get up at seven in the morning, make myself an omelet sandwich get on my bike by seven thirty and head on down the road. I get to Toll Just as Bryn is leaving and we immediately head to the site where the First Lady will be speaking. Once we get their we find her supervisor who is also the assistant mayor. He grabs us puts us in the truck with him and we go run some errands. It is interesting to note that this guy will most likely be the next mayor of Richard Toll, and he was picking up tee shirts, delivering ribbons for decorations and picked up the podium. In the US a person would be hired on to do all of these smaller jobs, but not here. We ran around like chickens with our heads cut off and finally arrived at the spot where she was going to speak. The supervisor tells us to go to the stage and sit. So we find a good spot in the middle, two rows behind where the First Lady will sit and we wait. After everything fills up they start to add some extra chairs to the stage because they were a few short. Then finally she arrives and we are two rows behind her for the entire time. Oh yeah, the two white people behind her on the news, one of them was me. People told me they saw me. I am special. After the speech she takes off and we head back to the apartment to hang out before the dinner.
The dinner was great, they cooked a lamb on a grill, and a chicken. We also had onions as our side dish. Yes you heard me right, the dinner was meat and onion sauce. No salad, no fries, but it was very American style since we all got our own plates and a knife. There really is a technique to eating with a hand and a knife. For dessert we had watermelon. I can’t even explain how much watermelon I have been eating. It is less than a dollar for an entire melon so I have been buying them for gifts and eating it for breakfast.
As far as work goes I have been going to the Center of Formation for the Femme, which means they teach English, French, Accounting, Management, and some other professional things. The Senegalese government and the Luxembourg government run it. The problem is that they are out of funding to run the program so maybe in a few months I can try to help get funding or help make them self funded which has been a big crutch from them so far.
That is all form the other side of the Atlantic. By the way, please send me mail, it makes my day.
I decided to add this on at the end because this is all fresh information. I had one of my best moments and one of my worst moments all in the same day. Today I decided to make a way to hold my mosquito net up. I went and found used tomato cans, thrown away bed frame, and cement to build my apparatus. The reason I am so proud of this was that I have never mixed concert before and the entire time I was I had a group of workers who at the same time were using concrete, just watching me. They spoke under their breath and laughed at what I was doing. The great thing was when I finished one guy came over took a look pointed one thing out to me and told me I did a good job. Now for the worst time, I had to pay rent to my host dad for the month. I knew I was going to be out of town for a few days so I decided I tried to explain I would pay a little less for the days I was going to miss. Rather than discussing it he yelled, brought everyone in the family into my room, told me we were family and I should pay the money I need to. This isn’t a hotel I don’t just pay for the meals. So after getting yelled at for by my host mom and host dad, I realized they had all of this work done on the house and couldn’t pay it until I gave them all the money. I’m just writing this to get it of my chest. I love it here in Senegal and when I notice my language improves or I get invited to peoples house to eat and drink tea. I know that it is worth being here and it is going to be rough at times.
Love
Josh (Djiby)
A Million Little Pieces,
The Book of Guys,
The Discomfort Zone by Jonathan Franzen
and my French book is Ma Babouche Pour Toujours. (Don’t ask me what that means. I still need a dictioinary.) Alisa I think that you would really like “The Chosen” if you haven’t read it and Lea you will also like it, but only if you follow through with Birth Right.
Song: Since Your Gone, Josh Ritter. It makes me laugh. Thanks Katie!
Ten ways you know you are in Senegal.
10: You feel like you have accomplished something if you leave the house and have a conversation.
9: You see a concave of trucks everyday with loud speakers cruising the streets. Sometimes they yell about the President, play music, or promote a phone company.
8: You only have the option to buy one product because there is only one company that makes the product.
7: You pay the hotel by the hour. (Hotels are popular in factory towns.)
6: You know you really shouldn’t jump in the river and swim because of shisto, but decide to do it anyways.
5: You see a large truck where the entire side is open and has pictures of soup cubes and there are over a hundred women with their yellow buckets clapping to the music waqiting for free soup cubes.
4: You hear someone say that Djiby is a good dancer. He dance Senegalese.
3: You get a thorn stuck in your foot every other step.
2: You walk into all the women in the family sitting in a semi circle two feet away from the TV watching Spanish soap operas and yelling at the TV.
1: You get to sit on the same stage as the presidents wife just because you wonder on it and no one says anything to you. Yeah I’m a celebrity in Senegal. On the news and everything.
Which is a good intro to my story. We will call it Djibi’s crazy day in Richard Toll. So a few days ago I get a text message from my neighbor to the West to come to Toll and meet the President’s wife. She will be talking about AIDs and prevention. I say well I will think about it and see what I have planned on that day. Two days later I get another text saying, “Djiby, I got us an invite to a BBQ with the UN.” They work for the United Nations refugee program. When I hear this I say well I guess I can make an effort to come into town and do this. I get up at seven in the morning, make myself an omelet sandwich get on my bike by seven thirty and head on down the road. I get to Toll Just as Bryn is leaving and we immediately head to the site where the First Lady will be speaking. Once we get their we find her supervisor who is also the assistant mayor. He grabs us puts us in the truck with him and we go run some errands. It is interesting to note that this guy will most likely be the next mayor of Richard Toll, and he was picking up tee shirts, delivering ribbons for decorations and picked up the podium. In the US a person would be hired on to do all of these smaller jobs, but not here. We ran around like chickens with our heads cut off and finally arrived at the spot where she was going to speak. The supervisor tells us to go to the stage and sit. So we find a good spot in the middle, two rows behind where the First Lady will sit and we wait. After everything fills up they start to add some extra chairs to the stage because they were a few short. Then finally she arrives and we are two rows behind her for the entire time. Oh yeah, the two white people behind her on the news, one of them was me. People told me they saw me. I am special. After the speech she takes off and we head back to the apartment to hang out before the dinner.
The dinner was great, they cooked a lamb on a grill, and a chicken. We also had onions as our side dish. Yes you heard me right, the dinner was meat and onion sauce. No salad, no fries, but it was very American style since we all got our own plates and a knife. There really is a technique to eating with a hand and a knife. For dessert we had watermelon. I can’t even explain how much watermelon I have been eating. It is less than a dollar for an entire melon so I have been buying them for gifts and eating it for breakfast.
As far as work goes I have been going to the Center of Formation for the Femme, which means they teach English, French, Accounting, Management, and some other professional things. The Senegalese government and the Luxembourg government run it. The problem is that they are out of funding to run the program so maybe in a few months I can try to help get funding or help make them self funded which has been a big crutch from them so far.
That is all form the other side of the Atlantic. By the way, please send me mail, it makes my day.
I decided to add this on at the end because this is all fresh information. I had one of my best moments and one of my worst moments all in the same day. Today I decided to make a way to hold my mosquito net up. I went and found used tomato cans, thrown away bed frame, and cement to build my apparatus. The reason I am so proud of this was that I have never mixed concert before and the entire time I was I had a group of workers who at the same time were using concrete, just watching me. They spoke under their breath and laughed at what I was doing. The great thing was when I finished one guy came over took a look pointed one thing out to me and told me I did a good job. Now for the worst time, I had to pay rent to my host dad for the month. I knew I was going to be out of town for a few days so I decided I tried to explain I would pay a little less for the days I was going to miss. Rather than discussing it he yelled, brought everyone in the family into my room, told me we were family and I should pay the money I need to. This isn’t a hotel I don’t just pay for the meals. So after getting yelled at for by my host mom and host dad, I realized they had all of this work done on the house and couldn’t pay it until I gave them all the money. I’m just writing this to get it of my chest. I love it here in Senegal and when I notice my language improves or I get invited to peoples house to eat and drink tea. I know that it is worth being here and it is going to be rough at times.
Love
Josh (Djiby)
Saturday, December 1, 2007
Funny story?
Book: Captain Courageous, and Robin Hood (in French) Bon Chance
Song: House of the Rising Sun, The Animals That is the first song I am learning on the guitar
Ok, I had to write again because I have a funny story. A few nights ago after dinner, my sister asked me to go on a walk a little ways. She said she had to go run an errand. I figure what could you possibly have to go do at nine besides run to a corner store and pick something up. So we start to walk a little ways and about half of a k I ask, “where are we going?”
She responds it is pretty far where were going, so at this point I know I am in for a nice surprise. With this new info I ask where are we going. She says that we are going to visit the Marabou (a religious leader). Ok why are we going to visit him.
She says “I have a headache.”
“Have you ever tried Advil?”
“It is not that type of headache. I have to get the evil spirits out of me.”
At this point I am thinking, what did I get myself into?
We arrive at the house after a nice long walk and we greet the women outside and she enters into a room in the compound, which I was not aloud to enter. I go and greet some more women who are sitting on the floor, but they only spoke Wolof so the conversation was very short. After a few minuets I hear a kid call my name and invite me into the room, and naturally I figure, better than standing outside. Who knows how long it will take for her to get the demons out. So I enter a room that is about the size of a small bedroom and there are over 20 kids sitting all over the ground. I get invited to sit next to the two older kids who were making tea at the time and we had a conversation and drank tea while I hade kids climbing on me. The most difficult thing was that one of the kids didn’t speak French so it was a short conversation. Most of the time was spent asking me if I had four wives.
After a brief talk, my sister came and got me, I drank some tea, shook 50 hands and went on my way.
Just thought that it was a little different story and something entertaining that has happened to me recently.
Song: House of the Rising Sun, The Animals That is the first song I am learning on the guitar
Ok, I had to write again because I have a funny story. A few nights ago after dinner, my sister asked me to go on a walk a little ways. She said she had to go run an errand. I figure what could you possibly have to go do at nine besides run to a corner store and pick something up. So we start to walk a little ways and about half of a k I ask, “where are we going?”
She responds it is pretty far where were going, so at this point I know I am in for a nice surprise. With this new info I ask where are we going. She says that we are going to visit the Marabou (a religious leader). Ok why are we going to visit him.
She says “I have a headache.”
“Have you ever tried Advil?”
“It is not that type of headache. I have to get the evil spirits out of me.”
At this point I am thinking, what did I get myself into?
We arrive at the house after a nice long walk and we greet the women outside and she enters into a room in the compound, which I was not aloud to enter. I go and greet some more women who are sitting on the floor, but they only spoke Wolof so the conversation was very short. After a few minuets I hear a kid call my name and invite me into the room, and naturally I figure, better than standing outside. Who knows how long it will take for her to get the demons out. So I enter a room that is about the size of a small bedroom and there are over 20 kids sitting all over the ground. I get invited to sit next to the two older kids who were making tea at the time and we had a conversation and drank tea while I hade kids climbing on me. The most difficult thing was that one of the kids didn’t speak French so it was a short conversation. Most of the time was spent asking me if I had four wives.
After a brief talk, my sister came and got me, I drank some tea, shook 50 hands and went on my way.
Just thought that it was a little different story and something entertaining that has happened to me recently.
Monday, November 26, 2007
Dagana Dagana
Book: Captains Courageous By Rudyard Kipling
Song: Instant Karma By John Lennon
10 ways my life has changed;
1, I ride my bike 20 k to get mail and use the internet.
2, I work out every day, but I use buckets of water for weights.
3, I look at Mauritania every day, weird.
4, I try to learn French but people only speak to me in Wolof, so my French still sucks and my Wolof is way worse. I can only say Mangi Dem, I go.
5, Every single time I step outside my compound I get rushed by at least 3 kids. One of which looks like he is 40. I will get a picture.
6, Every single place I go, every single person stops what they are doing and looks. Just like in the “Three Amigos” when they step into the bar in Mexico.
7, I eat all meals with a spoon or if it’s not rice I use my hands to eat.
8, Every single day for lunch I eat is fish and rice. Every day I like it a little more.
9, Every day I read 70 to 120 pages in my book.
10, I drink 2 to 6 cups of tea a day. They are only shots of tea but each shot has a little over one teaspoon of sugar in it. I brush my teeth a lot.
Sorry it has been so long since I last wrote. I got to Dagana to discover the internet, but it works so slow I really got nothing accomplished in the hour I used it. I got to one email gave up and tried to surf the web. After that I went to Richard Toll to use the internet but the reso was not working there so I had to wait a little. But now to start from where I had left off.
All has been going well, I recently have left my family in Theis, which was sad because they are very nice people and I wish that they could of stayed my family, but as it goes I have a new one. My older brother has actually called me and texted me how much he misses me hanging out with him and his friends at the boutique on the corner. That is generally how we passed the nights.
I was excited to get to my site and but before getting to Dagana I spent three nights in St. Louis with two other volunteers waiting to get installed. We had a good time hanging around and trying to bargain with the locals. I bought a new bed and that was about it since I figured a town of 25,000 I could probably buy what I need here. Boy, was I wrong. I can’t buy a stove anywhere. The city was nice but I got a little bored of it after 3 days. The third day the country director came and picked me up to go to site. At this point I was starting to get a little nervous and starting to worry about everything. The language, my room, the whole deal. We finally get to Dagana after a short drive and dropping another volunteer off in the middle of nowhere. We pull up to my house and my dad comes out to greet me. That is when it really got interesting. Within the first two seconds of hearing my dad speak I couldn’t understand one word he said. He mumbled and didn’t move his teeth when he spoke. I looked straight at the country director, he looked at me and I knew that was it. We walked into my new home into my rooms, which I didn’t realize were my rooms because they had everyone else’s stuff in them and it was dirty. I said hi to the rest of my family and sat down. Immediately my dad started to ask about money and paying bills so I knew it was going to be a difficult transition period into the house. After 10 min of questioning me about money I was qued to start dragging my stuff out of the car. The only problem was that I had nowhere to put my stuff because my room was occupied by all of the family’s materials. As soon as my stuff was in the house the CD looked at me sighed and said, “You have my number, right? Call me if you need anything. Good luck.” I just stared back thinking to myself, oh my good what have I gotten myself into. The car pulled away and we started cleaning up my rooms. Which by the way are some of the nicest in country, but make my frat house in college look like the Ritz (for all of you who have seen my frat you are probably laughing.) Before we started the cleaning process I met everyone and got down names. I thought I had a mom, a dad, 4 sisters, an aunt, and a maid, but as it turns out I was very wrong. I have a dad, two moms, a cousin, the aunt doesn’t live with us, a grandma who wears the same outfit everyday the last two weeks, one sister with one mom, another sister with the other, and a niece whose mom doesn’t live with us. That is who lives with us I actually have 9 brothers and sisters 7 of which don’t live with us. You can also imagine how awkward it is when you find out the lady you thought was a maid is actually your second mom. The second wife does a lot of the work in the house so it was very confusing. But now I have it down although I can only remember a few of the names. Luckily they have namesakes so I have two Awa, and two Fatou. It helps. As I have been writing this blog I just drank two cups of tea, it is 8 at night so it was my 5th cup of the day. We also have after dinner tea which means I will have atleast two more cups.
Moving into my new house was very hard since I really couldn’t understand my dad’s French and my family will only speak to me in wolof. I get very tired each day and find myself taking frequent cat naps to help me get through the day. I have also been working out in my bathroom, which is a good release of energy. Another hobby of mine is going down to the river and watching the sunset over Mauritania. I spend a lot of my time reading, and going around the town speaking or trying to find new things. I have not yet my counterpart since I was just dropped off at my site and have no way of contacting her. I have been showing myself around town. So far I have been going to the French classes in the high school and now sit in M. Duff’s class at 10 every morning. At 12 I go to his house drink tea and he helps me with my French. After that I go home and sleep, read, play the guitar, work out, anything to stay busy. Around 4:30 I go to a garden and help out while the teenagers or kids speak to me to help me with my language. I have learned that the only thing that can hold me back is fear at this point. I had to go to the garden and offer to help. No one did it for me, my dad helped me get into the class at the lycee, but I am the one who set the schedule and the tutoring lessons. I am the one who goes to the maison communale and speaks with the employees and reads at their library, I have no choice but to be social or I will fail and be miserable. This experience thus far has given me a lot of confidence and has made me become more of an adult, but I would be lying to you if I said I wasn’t scared to go and speak to all these people. What makes it a little easier is that I am white and American. As funny as that sounds, I just can go to city hall, walk into the mayor’s office without an appointment and hangout for the day. People want to know the white guy and it is important for me to get to know the people in power. Even if I can’t communicate very well right know, the fact that I go and say hello to the mayor, makes me just as important as that mayor. People will see me with the mayor and think I am very important. I also have been working on a scheme of fame. I have been finding all of the pockets of children and teaching them my name. So whenever I go anywhere in town, the children start to chant my name and wave. I am going for a “Lawrence of Arabia” moment when all the people chant his name, or a “Volunteers” moment. By the way my name is Djibril Fall aka Djibi (Jibi) or in English Gabriel. I have the coolest name in Senegal, I love it. Any who this is starting to get really long so I will save you something for my next blog if I can make the 20 k ride. I almost died since there are not to many trees and the wind was going, along with a uphill ride all the way home.
(My dad has a really dumpy car that we have to push start some times, it is his baby and the other day he was really mad because when he was driving at night he ran over some kids bike, because his lights don’t work. He was telling me all about how the kid shouldn’t of been their. Now he is mad at the fam because he had to honk his horn three times before some one would open the gate for his car. My life is funny.
Ps, There is a cricket in my room for the past two weeks that is really loud, but when I find it there will be a tortures death involved.
Peace, Love
Djibi
Song: Instant Karma By John Lennon
10 ways my life has changed;
1, I ride my bike 20 k to get mail and use the internet.
2, I work out every day, but I use buckets of water for weights.
3, I look at Mauritania every day, weird.
4, I try to learn French but people only speak to me in Wolof, so my French still sucks and my Wolof is way worse. I can only say Mangi Dem, I go.
5, Every single time I step outside my compound I get rushed by at least 3 kids. One of which looks like he is 40. I will get a picture.
6, Every single place I go, every single person stops what they are doing and looks. Just like in the “Three Amigos” when they step into the bar in Mexico.
7, I eat all meals with a spoon or if it’s not rice I use my hands to eat.
8, Every single day for lunch I eat is fish and rice. Every day I like it a little more.
9, Every day I read 70 to 120 pages in my book.
10, I drink 2 to 6 cups of tea a day. They are only shots of tea but each shot has a little over one teaspoon of sugar in it. I brush my teeth a lot.
Sorry it has been so long since I last wrote. I got to Dagana to discover the internet, but it works so slow I really got nothing accomplished in the hour I used it. I got to one email gave up and tried to surf the web. After that I went to Richard Toll to use the internet but the reso was not working there so I had to wait a little. But now to start from where I had left off.
All has been going well, I recently have left my family in Theis, which was sad because they are very nice people and I wish that they could of stayed my family, but as it goes I have a new one. My older brother has actually called me and texted me how much he misses me hanging out with him and his friends at the boutique on the corner. That is generally how we passed the nights.
I was excited to get to my site and but before getting to Dagana I spent three nights in St. Louis with two other volunteers waiting to get installed. We had a good time hanging around and trying to bargain with the locals. I bought a new bed and that was about it since I figured a town of 25,000 I could probably buy what I need here. Boy, was I wrong. I can’t buy a stove anywhere. The city was nice but I got a little bored of it after 3 days. The third day the country director came and picked me up to go to site. At this point I was starting to get a little nervous and starting to worry about everything. The language, my room, the whole deal. We finally get to Dagana after a short drive and dropping another volunteer off in the middle of nowhere. We pull up to my house and my dad comes out to greet me. That is when it really got interesting. Within the first two seconds of hearing my dad speak I couldn’t understand one word he said. He mumbled and didn’t move his teeth when he spoke. I looked straight at the country director, he looked at me and I knew that was it. We walked into my new home into my rooms, which I didn’t realize were my rooms because they had everyone else’s stuff in them and it was dirty. I said hi to the rest of my family and sat down. Immediately my dad started to ask about money and paying bills so I knew it was going to be a difficult transition period into the house. After 10 min of questioning me about money I was qued to start dragging my stuff out of the car. The only problem was that I had nowhere to put my stuff because my room was occupied by all of the family’s materials. As soon as my stuff was in the house the CD looked at me sighed and said, “You have my number, right? Call me if you need anything. Good luck.” I just stared back thinking to myself, oh my good what have I gotten myself into. The car pulled away and we started cleaning up my rooms. Which by the way are some of the nicest in country, but make my frat house in college look like the Ritz (for all of you who have seen my frat you are probably laughing.) Before we started the cleaning process I met everyone and got down names. I thought I had a mom, a dad, 4 sisters, an aunt, and a maid, but as it turns out I was very wrong. I have a dad, two moms, a cousin, the aunt doesn’t live with us, a grandma who wears the same outfit everyday the last two weeks, one sister with one mom, another sister with the other, and a niece whose mom doesn’t live with us. That is who lives with us I actually have 9 brothers and sisters 7 of which don’t live with us. You can also imagine how awkward it is when you find out the lady you thought was a maid is actually your second mom. The second wife does a lot of the work in the house so it was very confusing. But now I have it down although I can only remember a few of the names. Luckily they have namesakes so I have two Awa, and two Fatou. It helps. As I have been writing this blog I just drank two cups of tea, it is 8 at night so it was my 5th cup of the day. We also have after dinner tea which means I will have atleast two more cups.
Moving into my new house was very hard since I really couldn’t understand my dad’s French and my family will only speak to me in wolof. I get very tired each day and find myself taking frequent cat naps to help me get through the day. I have also been working out in my bathroom, which is a good release of energy. Another hobby of mine is going down to the river and watching the sunset over Mauritania. I spend a lot of my time reading, and going around the town speaking or trying to find new things. I have not yet my counterpart since I was just dropped off at my site and have no way of contacting her. I have been showing myself around town. So far I have been going to the French classes in the high school and now sit in M. Duff’s class at 10 every morning. At 12 I go to his house drink tea and he helps me with my French. After that I go home and sleep, read, play the guitar, work out, anything to stay busy. Around 4:30 I go to a garden and help out while the teenagers or kids speak to me to help me with my language. I have learned that the only thing that can hold me back is fear at this point. I had to go to the garden and offer to help. No one did it for me, my dad helped me get into the class at the lycee, but I am the one who set the schedule and the tutoring lessons. I am the one who goes to the maison communale and speaks with the employees and reads at their library, I have no choice but to be social or I will fail and be miserable. This experience thus far has given me a lot of confidence and has made me become more of an adult, but I would be lying to you if I said I wasn’t scared to go and speak to all these people. What makes it a little easier is that I am white and American. As funny as that sounds, I just can go to city hall, walk into the mayor’s office without an appointment and hangout for the day. People want to know the white guy and it is important for me to get to know the people in power. Even if I can’t communicate very well right know, the fact that I go and say hello to the mayor, makes me just as important as that mayor. People will see me with the mayor and think I am very important. I also have been working on a scheme of fame. I have been finding all of the pockets of children and teaching them my name. So whenever I go anywhere in town, the children start to chant my name and wave. I am going for a “Lawrence of Arabia” moment when all the people chant his name, or a “Volunteers” moment. By the way my name is Djibril Fall aka Djibi (Jibi) or in English Gabriel. I have the coolest name in Senegal, I love it. Any who this is starting to get really long so I will save you something for my next blog if I can make the 20 k ride. I almost died since there are not to many trees and the wind was going, along with a uphill ride all the way home.
(My dad has a really dumpy car that we have to push start some times, it is his baby and the other day he was really mad because when he was driving at night he ran over some kids bike, because his lights don’t work. He was telling me all about how the kid shouldn’t of been their. Now he is mad at the fam because he had to honk his horn three times before some one would open the gate for his car. My life is funny.
Ps, There is a cricket in my room for the past two weeks that is really loud, but when I find it there will be a tortures death involved.
Peace, Love
Djibi
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Nouveau Volenteer
Book: The Count Of Monte Cristo
Song: Ball and Biscuit, White Stripes
Yeah, yeasterday I sworn in and am now officialy a volunteer in Crorps de la Paix. We had a small ceremony at teh house of the US Ambassador. It was nice and they televised the entire ceremony on National television. I have already had people coming up to me and telling me that they saw me on teh tele. It is even funnier because there are only 9 channels and we were on the first channel which 80% of the country leaves their tele on. I am a celebrety now. On a more seriouse note, I leave tommorow for St. Louie and then Dagana. I am leaving all 39 people behind. After this week I will have to ride my bike 20 K on through the desert inorder to speak with some one in English. At this point I can only laugh and say that I will be in good shape by the end of two years. i have already lost 12 lbs and am starting to thin out a little. My family eqats well in teh North from what I hear but the volunteer befor me lost 20 lbs at site in two years. I am getting a little nervouse also because my family only speaks Wolof and all I speak is bad French. I get to be a baby that is contious of his world. It will be a good experience and I look forward to taking it all in and having this experience. I don't know when I will be able to write again because my site might not have Internet, but when I figure it out i will drop u all a line.
Love Josh
Song: Ball and Biscuit, White Stripes
Yeah, yeasterday I sworn in and am now officialy a volunteer in Crorps de la Paix. We had a small ceremony at teh house of the US Ambassador. It was nice and they televised the entire ceremony on National television. I have already had people coming up to me and telling me that they saw me on teh tele. It is even funnier because there are only 9 channels and we were on the first channel which 80% of the country leaves their tele on. I am a celebrety now. On a more seriouse note, I leave tommorow for St. Louie and then Dagana. I am leaving all 39 people behind. After this week I will have to ride my bike 20 K on through the desert inorder to speak with some one in English. At this point I can only laugh and say that I will be in good shape by the end of two years. i have already lost 12 lbs and am starting to thin out a little. My family eqats well in teh North from what I hear but the volunteer befor me lost 20 lbs at site in two years. I am getting a little nervouse also because my family only speaks Wolof and all I speak is bad French. I get to be a baby that is contious of his world. It will be a good experience and I look forward to taking it all in and having this experience. I don't know when I will be able to write again because my site might not have Internet, but when I figure it out i will drop u all a line.
Love Josh
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
The Beach
Song of the moment: The underdog by Spoon
Book of the month: A coffin for Dimitrios by Eric Amber
I decided that it would be a good time to start trying to do a few more blogs since I will be going to site where the Internet is uncertain. They have been trying to get the Internet at my site for a while so it might be in by the time arrive. Since we have last spoken my stage took a trip to a National park called Popenguine. It was amazing; there were cliffs to the left and large rock formations to the right. We had a house on the beach. It cost me 7,500 CFA for a place to stay, dinner, breakfast, and beer. That is the equivalent to $15, what a country. This coming week I will be going to Dakar to check out what the city is like. I also went to a wedding. It was a Seereer wedding which is different then most, beer and it lasted 3 days. There was a lot of music and dancing. The dancing here is so crazy. It’s funny today a new person has showed up in the house. Apparently he is my cousin and he lives with us. It is fun because I get a new family member every few weeks moving into the house.
This past weekend I went to Dakar and got to blow off a little steam. The first day we arrived we walked around and looked for a hotel. After we found one we ended up getting a room for the three people which was a little problem since there was six of us. After devising several plans to sneak into the room with six people we decided to just greet every person who worked in the hotel and use Wolof to communicate. It worked like a charm, we had no trouble keeping six people in a room, and what is even better is the fact that noise is not an issue in Senegal. People are always loud. In Dakar we did a lot of club hopping which involved being the only people at the bars along with a few French soldiers. The second day in Dakar we went to the American club which sounds lame, but it was some of the most fun I have had in a while. We swam and played beach volleyball for a few hours. It was all-free, but peculiar to see little kids speaking English.
Book of the month: A coffin for Dimitrios by Eric Amber
I decided that it would be a good time to start trying to do a few more blogs since I will be going to site where the Internet is uncertain. They have been trying to get the Internet at my site for a while so it might be in by the time arrive. Since we have last spoken my stage took a trip to a National park called Popenguine. It was amazing; there were cliffs to the left and large rock formations to the right. We had a house on the beach. It cost me 7,500 CFA for a place to stay, dinner, breakfast, and beer. That is the equivalent to $15, what a country. This coming week I will be going to Dakar to check out what the city is like. I also went to a wedding. It was a Seereer wedding which is different then most, beer and it lasted 3 days. There was a lot of music and dancing. The dancing here is so crazy. It’s funny today a new person has showed up in the house. Apparently he is my cousin and he lives with us. It is fun because I get a new family member every few weeks moving into the house.
This past weekend I went to Dakar and got to blow off a little steam. The first day we arrived we walked around and looked for a hotel. After we found one we ended up getting a room for the three people which was a little problem since there was six of us. After devising several plans to sneak into the room with six people we decided to just greet every person who worked in the hotel and use Wolof to communicate. It worked like a charm, we had no trouble keeping six people in a room, and what is even better is the fact that noise is not an issue in Senegal. People are always loud. In Dakar we did a lot of club hopping which involved being the only people at the bars along with a few French soldiers. The second day in Dakar we went to the American club which sounds lame, but it was some of the most fun I have had in a while. We swam and played beach volleyball for a few hours. It was all-free, but peculiar to see little kids speaking English.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
First Month
Song of the month Pink Floyd; Heaven can Wait
Sorry that it has been so long between my post. I have had a lot going on right now which has made it difficult for me to be able to sit down and type. I currently have my host family, which is great. My mom Georgette is in her mid sixties and my dad is Jean-Gabou. He is in his seventies, is blind in one eye and is almost deaf. I thought my French was bad when I spoke to him, but he just couldn’t hear what I was saying. I have three brothers, Louie who is in his mid thirties and works as a physical education teacher. Pascal is another brother who works in textiles (I think). He is the father of Pape who has been the person who has helped me the most. Pape speaks to me all the time and we will go out for the occasional beer. That’s right I am in the 5% and have a Catholic family. They are Seerar. My other brother Philippe is ill as it was explained to me. He doesn’t speak at all and is extremely thin. I am not sure exactly what is wrong, but I am not sure if my family knows either. TIA (This is Africa) as we say. My sister Mary Angelic is a very nice woman. She does the majority of the cooking and cleaning. She wakes up with my mom every morning by 7 to start sweeping the courtyard. She has two kids. Ferdie who is 5 and Annyolan who is around one. Our house is basically, several separate rooms that lead outside to a courtyard. Since it is so hot we generally sit under one of our several lime trees. We always have chickens running free in our yard and a pigpen. A funny story, the other day I came home and noticed a pig was missing and a pot was on the stove. Naturally I was excited because I have eaten mostly fish and rice since my arrival. This would be one of my first meals without fish. I go up to Pape and ask if he needs help. He accepts and I grab a seat and the fan, which he had requested. He opens the pot and starts pulling piece by piece out of the pot parts of the pig’s head. First off was a snout. Apparently you can eat that. After the snout we got a jawbone and had to peel the meet off of that. The grand finally was the ears. Yeah, we made Pate with that. If you were curious to why I needed to help, it was to fan away the flies while we cooked. I was happy top hear that the pate was for sale and not for us to eat. But some things are lost in translation when he brought me a half loaf of French bread with Pate. By the way the only bread in Senegal in the cities is French bread. All I eat is rice and white bread. I am on the carb diet.
A typical day for me starts at 6:30 I wake up and get to the Center by 7:10. I generally ride my bike while the Talibae yell at me. My spelling is probably wrong but the Talibae is a group of children who are sent to live with a Marabou. The Marabou can’t afford to but these 8-10 year olds anything so he sends them out to the streets to beg. Since I am white and the only white people they see are on TV you can imagine what they think. I have all of the money. It is difficult to not feel bad for these kids but you can’t give money to each kid or you would go broke by the time you went a kilo. The other day I went to a house with Pape to watch prison break and a little girl freaked out and cried because she was scared of me. It is very weird to have all eyes on you. In other cases kids will come up and shake my hand or pull on my arm hair because no one has hair on their bodies here.
I unfortunately have dealt with death also. A safety trainer from the Peace Corps, died on his way to a site. He was in a car accident. He was a very nice man who worked very hard for us to be safe. It was difficult to deal with because many of the trainers couldn’t work and we witnessed several of the prayers. We also went to his house to pay respects to his wife. I have never seen anything like it before. Everyone is gathered in the courtyard, the women sit on mats on the floor while the men sit in plastic chairs. You go drink tea and pay your respects.
Once again sorry for having so many scattered thoughts but I have been here for a month and all of this happened. Yesterday I went to a Baptism and saw a goat gets skinned and deboweled. Now if you have never seen anything like that, I recommend it. If it were the only time you have eaten meat in a month you would have no problem watching it and seeing how it is prepared. It is a way of life. In other news I got my site placement. Holy Smokes, I am going far north into the desert. Dagana, Senegal. It is on the river bordering Mauritania. 25,000 people 2km by 5km. My closest neighbor is 20km away and the closest neighbor I already know is 47km. I am 125 km away from st Louie, but that is a 3-hour ride in Senegal. By the way someone please send me anti motion sickness pills. The engineers here thought it wise to put asphalt roads on top of dirt, so in the rainy season when the dirt roads the asphalt falls through and causes some nice pot holes. There is a handicapped organization I will work with and a new high school where I will help teach English. That is my plan as of now, but I need to get some business in somewhere so we will see. One of the subsidized sugar factories is in my town and a tomato canning plant is there. I am in the middle of nowhere and it is rocky and sandy. But I am only two hours away from the two best national parks in Senegal. There is a third one I will see but that is South East. That will take me a two or three days drive. Hhahahahah. TIA Imagine if you liveed in a world without a cell phone, no Internet, no cars, and one day you just had it. No knowledge of how it works or any concept of its origin. Their would be no regulations for car safety, no concept of the value of a phone, no idea how to drive, and no idea of edicate. I was at the cyber and the guys on either side of me were looking at porn. That is a normal occurrence. Just a thought to leave you with.
I live in a fish bowl, I can eat, dress, act Senegalese, but no matter what, I am not Senegalese and people are here to remind me of that fact every day. My skin has become thick and imagine if you have only seen black people on the television and you finally saw one for the first time. Would you stair, yell, grab at, beg from, welcome, or cry from being scared. Every day I see these reactions and it shocks me because we live in a different world. Most experience has been good for me, and I like it here, but when you think stuff is hard for you, think about what you have, because the people here have it a hundred times harder and they are the happiest people I have met. One month down 25 to go.
Sorry that it has been so long between my post. I have had a lot going on right now which has made it difficult for me to be able to sit down and type. I currently have my host family, which is great. My mom Georgette is in her mid sixties and my dad is Jean-Gabou. He is in his seventies, is blind in one eye and is almost deaf. I thought my French was bad when I spoke to him, but he just couldn’t hear what I was saying. I have three brothers, Louie who is in his mid thirties and works as a physical education teacher. Pascal is another brother who works in textiles (I think). He is the father of Pape who has been the person who has helped me the most. Pape speaks to me all the time and we will go out for the occasional beer. That’s right I am in the 5% and have a Catholic family. They are Seerar. My other brother Philippe is ill as it was explained to me. He doesn’t speak at all and is extremely thin. I am not sure exactly what is wrong, but I am not sure if my family knows either. TIA (This is Africa) as we say. My sister Mary Angelic is a very nice woman. She does the majority of the cooking and cleaning. She wakes up with my mom every morning by 7 to start sweeping the courtyard. She has two kids. Ferdie who is 5 and Annyolan who is around one. Our house is basically, several separate rooms that lead outside to a courtyard. Since it is so hot we generally sit under one of our several lime trees. We always have chickens running free in our yard and a pigpen. A funny story, the other day I came home and noticed a pig was missing and a pot was on the stove. Naturally I was excited because I have eaten mostly fish and rice since my arrival. This would be one of my first meals without fish. I go up to Pape and ask if he needs help. He accepts and I grab a seat and the fan, which he had requested. He opens the pot and starts pulling piece by piece out of the pot parts of the pig’s head. First off was a snout. Apparently you can eat that. After the snout we got a jawbone and had to peel the meet off of that. The grand finally was the ears. Yeah, we made Pate with that. If you were curious to why I needed to help, it was to fan away the flies while we cooked. I was happy top hear that the pate was for sale and not for us to eat. But some things are lost in translation when he brought me a half loaf of French bread with Pate. By the way the only bread in Senegal in the cities is French bread. All I eat is rice and white bread. I am on the carb diet.
A typical day for me starts at 6:30 I wake up and get to the Center by 7:10. I generally ride my bike while the Talibae yell at me. My spelling is probably wrong but the Talibae is a group of children who are sent to live with a Marabou. The Marabou can’t afford to but these 8-10 year olds anything so he sends them out to the streets to beg. Since I am white and the only white people they see are on TV you can imagine what they think. I have all of the money. It is difficult to not feel bad for these kids but you can’t give money to each kid or you would go broke by the time you went a kilo. The other day I went to a house with Pape to watch prison break and a little girl freaked out and cried because she was scared of me. It is very weird to have all eyes on you. In other cases kids will come up and shake my hand or pull on my arm hair because no one has hair on their bodies here.
I unfortunately have dealt with death also. A safety trainer from the Peace Corps, died on his way to a site. He was in a car accident. He was a very nice man who worked very hard for us to be safe. It was difficult to deal with because many of the trainers couldn’t work and we witnessed several of the prayers. We also went to his house to pay respects to his wife. I have never seen anything like it before. Everyone is gathered in the courtyard, the women sit on mats on the floor while the men sit in plastic chairs. You go drink tea and pay your respects.
Once again sorry for having so many scattered thoughts but I have been here for a month and all of this happened. Yesterday I went to a Baptism and saw a goat gets skinned and deboweled. Now if you have never seen anything like that, I recommend it. If it were the only time you have eaten meat in a month you would have no problem watching it and seeing how it is prepared. It is a way of life. In other news I got my site placement. Holy Smokes, I am going far north into the desert. Dagana, Senegal. It is on the river bordering Mauritania. 25,000 people 2km by 5km. My closest neighbor is 20km away and the closest neighbor I already know is 47km. I am 125 km away from st Louie, but that is a 3-hour ride in Senegal. By the way someone please send me anti motion sickness pills. The engineers here thought it wise to put asphalt roads on top of dirt, so in the rainy season when the dirt roads the asphalt falls through and causes some nice pot holes. There is a handicapped organization I will work with and a new high school where I will help teach English. That is my plan as of now, but I need to get some business in somewhere so we will see. One of the subsidized sugar factories is in my town and a tomato canning plant is there. I am in the middle of nowhere and it is rocky and sandy. But I am only two hours away from the two best national parks in Senegal. There is a third one I will see but that is South East. That will take me a two or three days drive. Hhahahahah. TIA Imagine if you liveed in a world without a cell phone, no Internet, no cars, and one day you just had it. No knowledge of how it works or any concept of its origin. Their would be no regulations for car safety, no concept of the value of a phone, no idea how to drive, and no idea of edicate. I was at the cyber and the guys on either side of me were looking at porn. That is a normal occurrence. Just a thought to leave you with.
I live in a fish bowl, I can eat, dress, act Senegalese, but no matter what, I am not Senegalese and people are here to remind me of that fact every day. My skin has become thick and imagine if you have only seen black people on the television and you finally saw one for the first time. Would you stair, yell, grab at, beg from, welcome, or cry from being scared. Every day I see these reactions and it shocks me because we live in a different world. Most experience has been good for me, and I like it here, but when you think stuff is hard for you, think about what you have, because the people here have it a hundred times harder and they are the happiest people I have met. One month down 25 to go.
Monday, September 17, 2007
I hope every one is doing well. It has been a few crazy days for me so far. Talk about a culture shock. We had a staging oin atlanta where we got to meet everyone and become friends. It went very well because everyone in the group is about my age. We mostly spent time talking about what it will be like when we arrive o site. It wasn't very helpful, but it calmed the nerves. The hotel was very nice and each person had a queen sized bed which had 10 pillows on it and a nice AC. I say that since I am in over 100 degree weather with no ac. We headed from atlanta to Dakar. Our plane was also heading to South africa. The funny part was when we landded in Dakar, we were the only ones to get off. Even the baggage guy didn't belive I wwas getting of in Dakar. I think he was trying to tell me something when he said "Your not going to South Africa?" After arriving in Dakar we noticed the diffrence immediatly. It was as if we stepped into another world. There were about three guys working the inside of the terminal while four guys were sleeping on the floor. The baggage came in on the only conveyor belt and then we headed to the bus. As we walked outside there were about 200 men tanding next to the airport behind baracades stairing at us. No one said a word to us except for a few men who hold out their hands for you to shake them. Aftre a long bus ride we arrived to the training center which is called Theis (Chess). The drive was very akward since I have never been to aplace like this. Most buildings are cement or tin. people are walking in the road and everyone is stairing. After arriving at the training center they reeted us with a tam tam, or drumm as you would call it. Then we began the process. we were assigned rooms and given a chance to sleep under these musqioto nets. Which are 20 degres hoter inside. Since trainuibg we have been doing survival Wolof which is the main language spoken. I have been having a very difficult time since words ar crazy. Like thank you is jerejef. Words can have mb right next to eachother or tudd means name, but the dd has to be said stuttering. I wa really getting frusytrated since I can't get it. Luckily we have had a chance to go to dymistification which sends me and another trainee to a village where people voluntering are. We are right now in Joal which is a fishng town south of Dakar. it is beautiful and the people are great. The children run and yell toubab toubab every time we pass by. Which means white or foreighner. I hear that about a thousand times a day. It satrts to get a little annoyinhg but that is what the kids do. I hope to send some pics soon but it still may be a little. When I walk in the street I have to greet everyone and that is the nmost important thing. For example:
Asalaa Malacuum
Malacuum Saam
Nanga Def
Mangi Fi(rekk)
Naka Waa keer ga
Nunga fa
Cava
Cava cava bien bien
Nanga laa tudd
Josh laa tudd. (Every one calls me Jass)
Fan nga Joggee
Americ laa jogee
Fan chi amric
Michigan Chi americAt this point i jhave no wolof left so I go to cava. A five min walk can take 20 min. I havn't had a meal on teh floor yet with a family except for training so far but i have eaten at the house of momadu nji which is a very generous man. They always make you try to eat more than you can which is makes it difficult to say no.they always ionsit kind of likle mom with the appetizers.Any who i have to get going i am out of time. i get my family this thursday and I want to say happy b day katie. I love you all and i sweat non stop.
Asalaa Malacuum
Malacuum Saam
Nanga Def
Mangi Fi(rekk)
Naka Waa keer ga
Nunga fa
Cava
Cava cava bien bien
Nanga laa tudd
Josh laa tudd. (Every one calls me Jass)
Fan nga Joggee
Americ laa jogee
Fan chi amric
Michigan Chi americAt this point i jhave no wolof left so I go to cava. A five min walk can take 20 min. I havn't had a meal on teh floor yet with a family except for training so far but i have eaten at the house of momadu nji which is a very generous man. They always make you try to eat more than you can which is makes it difficult to say no.they always ionsit kind of likle mom with the appetizers.Any who i have to get going i am out of time. i get my family this thursday and I want to say happy b day katie. I love you all and i sweat non stop.
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Great Summer
I couldn't sleep so I decided to write my blog this morning. So far the summer has been great. I traveled through French Canada with my dad for a few weeks. I did a road trip with my girlfriend. I got to see my friends across the country. Best of all i got to spend time with my family. I am very excited to be leaving for Senegal in 12 days. I am also very nervous since I don't know what to expect. I am excited and wanted to get this blog out so people can start signing up and getting connected. Thank you to everyone who is going to stay in touch with me.
Much love
Much love
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