Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
kaolack round 2 plus keur madiabel
asalamalekum! i'm back in dakar after another trip to kaolack and another village called keur madiabel (don't quote me on the spelling). the size of this family never ceases to amaze me, no matter where i go i'm always with some new cousin or uncle or something. the senegalese family, as i was told, is meant to be huge, and when you consider that many of the men have multiple wives, you can see how it's not so hard to have more than 15 kids under the same roof. it's a custom i'm not quite accustomed to yet, but it's life here. here's a street view of kaolack- it's very very sandy and hot, and it's not necessarily the cleanest place in the world, but babacar (host brother) is a part of an organization that has done a lot of work to clean it up.
this past sunday were elections, and being that i'm never totally sure what's going on here, i can't tell you exactly what they were for, BUT i can tell you that it was a pretty big deal- i heard rallies and speeches long into the night. apparently, the person they wanted won (and ironically enough, he's related to the family that i have been with-- and aims to be the future president of senegal, so if that happens i'll be able to say i was in the president of senegal's house...) one night before the elections, mama ami had a meeting outside her house and a whole lot of people were there including these women below, who set up in the middle of the circle and at any break in the meeting would begin singing and drumming and women from the circle would jump up and start dancing. again, i had no idea what was going on or what the meeting was about- but let me tell you, senegalese women can dance.
thankfully i had a senegalese ally (my big little sister sophie) who protected me from having to dance, i'm all for having fun but i was not about to make myself a spectacle at a meeting, it was already obvious enough everyone wanted to see the toubab (foreigner) dance. i explained to sophie, imagine if you were with my family in the US and then everyone started clapping and said "oo let's see the african dance!" after that analogy she understood and i was spared. the picture below is from that night when i recorded some of the speeches for the family.
when i made it to keur madiabel, i was with mame diarra, one of the cousins i met while she was in dakar and i stayed with her family. (after visiting the mansion of the future president of course) they were very nice and welcoming. it was in this village (where ame's wife adibi was born) that i met jess, a peace corps volunteer working on economic development. she was really nice and it was awesome to get to meet her. she also had all of her notes when she took wolof when she started her service, so i actually spent most of my time in the village working on wolof and getting some helpful input from her. i also met jan, a woman who had come to keur madiabel with a church group but had stayed longer, and she cooked jess and i american food for dinner 2 of the nights i was there! it was a nice unexpected treat. the picture below is of mame diarra and some kids that lived in the compound too.
after the village i returned to kaolack and hung out with the family a bit and practiced more wolof. i'm getting to the point now where i can understand people but have trouble forming a response, but people love when i try. the picture below is of me drinking attaya (tea) and writing in my journal.
and an update on the adorable kids- this little guy who's name sounds something like 'jim' and is four years old has officially declared his love for me. he always comes up to me and repeats the word 'apres' in french (i was informed its the only word he knows in french) and then proceeds to laugh hysterically and run away.
and what would a blog entry about kaolack be without a picture of nayfatou. everytime i play with her i'm more tempted to bring her home. how can anyone resist that face? no matter what time of day, she starts smiling whenever she sees me and if i put my hand over my face, she cracks up and puts her hand over her face too. precious.
so that sums up the last week. after all this though, i'm really excited to actually get to work and make my plans with dague for working with disabilities. i like hanging around towns and villages, but i'm ready for the next step.
this past sunday were elections, and being that i'm never totally sure what's going on here, i can't tell you exactly what they were for, BUT i can tell you that it was a pretty big deal- i heard rallies and speeches long into the night. apparently, the person they wanted won (and ironically enough, he's related to the family that i have been with-- and aims to be the future president of senegal, so if that happens i'll be able to say i was in the president of senegal's house...) one night before the elections, mama ami had a meeting outside her house and a whole lot of people were there including these women below, who set up in the middle of the circle and at any break in the meeting would begin singing and drumming and women from the circle would jump up and start dancing. again, i had no idea what was going on or what the meeting was about- but let me tell you, senegalese women can dance.
thankfully i had a senegalese ally (my big little sister sophie) who protected me from having to dance, i'm all for having fun but i was not about to make myself a spectacle at a meeting, it was already obvious enough everyone wanted to see the toubab (foreigner) dance. i explained to sophie, imagine if you were with my family in the US and then everyone started clapping and said "oo let's see the african dance!" after that analogy she understood and i was spared. the picture below is from that night when i recorded some of the speeches for the family.
when i made it to keur madiabel, i was with mame diarra, one of the cousins i met while she was in dakar and i stayed with her family. (after visiting the mansion of the future president of course) they were very nice and welcoming. it was in this village (where ame's wife adibi was born) that i met jess, a peace corps volunteer working on economic development. she was really nice and it was awesome to get to meet her. she also had all of her notes when she took wolof when she started her service, so i actually spent most of my time in the village working on wolof and getting some helpful input from her. i also met jan, a woman who had come to keur madiabel with a church group but had stayed longer, and she cooked jess and i american food for dinner 2 of the nights i was there! it was a nice unexpected treat. the picture below is of mame diarra and some kids that lived in the compound too.
after the village i returned to kaolack and hung out with the family a bit and practiced more wolof. i'm getting to the point now where i can understand people but have trouble forming a response, but people love when i try. the picture below is of me drinking attaya (tea) and writing in my journal.
and an update on the adorable kids- this little guy who's name sounds something like 'jim' and is four years old has officially declared his love for me. he always comes up to me and repeats the word 'apres' in french (i was informed its the only word he knows in french) and then proceeds to laugh hysterically and run away.
and what would a blog entry about kaolack be without a picture of nayfatou. everytime i play with her i'm more tempted to bring her home. how can anyone resist that face? no matter what time of day, she starts smiling whenever she sees me and if i put my hand over my face, she cracks up and puts her hand over her face too. precious.
so that sums up the last week. after all this though, i'm really excited to actually get to work and make my plans with dague for working with disabilities. i like hanging around towns and villages, but i'm ready for the next step.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
and i'm off!
i'm heading back to kaolack today for the second half of gamou- then i'm going to be going with mame diarra (cousin in the family) to her village nearby kaolack for a few days to get a real glimpse of village life here-- and my best attempt at a crash course in wolof. here in dakar, i actually have made some headway meeting with people from ashoka, and it looks like after this week, i'm going to be planning a tour with dague (a woman working with disabilities here) to go around senegal visiting disability organizations and ashoka fellows (social entrepreneurs addressing social issues) to gather information and learn about the regions of this country. after this, i'll be picking where i'd like to settle down for the rest of the year based on what i find on the trip! it sounds like a perfect plan for me and i'm really excited to figure it out, but first- i gotta get a LOT better at wolof! but i gotta go pack and i'll be sure to update after!
Thursday, March 12, 2009
kaolack and gamou
it's been a while since i've updated but i just got back to dakar last night from spending the last couple days in kaolack, senegal where i went to participate in the muslim holiday called gamou. i went with aissatou (one of ame's cousins) and stayed with her family and i had a great time- senegal has the reputation of being the country of teranga (hospitality) and i definitely saw it first hand. the family was incredibly welcoming to me and although i was a little nervous and overwhelmed at first, it wasn't long before i felt really comfortable there and started getting to know the family. i even got a senegalese name, Ami Dieye (after aissatou's mom and aunt)-- that seemed to really make everyone happy in the family, that and when i wore senegalese clothes. since it was the holiday, i had to dress up. i borrowed clothes from another cousin who was the same size as me and also had to cover my head whenever i left the house. the first picture below is from the first day i was there, when i took a walk with some of the family around the market and stumbled upon a procession of people heading towards the mosque in almost a military looking lineup. they were chanting and doing coordinated movements...i'll admit i had no idea what was going on most of the time, but in following babacar (not olivia's boyfriend but a member of aissatou's family) and another cousin through the streets, we ended up walking on the street mixed in with the procession (formed in two perfectly straight lines) despite the fact that the spectators were on the sides of the street- it was intense- but the picture below is with the son of someone important (i didn't know he was important at the time) but again, it was hard to follow everything about the holiday and the people involved.
gamou is the celebration of the prophet mohammed's birthday, so it's a pretty big deal. apparently people come from all over the world to kaolack to celebrate it. the mosque was all lit up and there were a lot of people in town. most of my time was spent in the house with the family, but people stopped in all day to visit. there were also a lot of gambians there (aissatou has family in gambia too-- it's the country that is surrounded by senegal) and apparently they speak english as a second language in gambia and french in senegal and wolof to each other, so i had a fun time trying to remember who was senegalese and who was gambian so that i would speak the right language to them. i saw a lot of confused faces as people waited for me to realize i was speaking to wrong language. on a really exciting note, i learned a lot of wolof in my few days there. one of the family members, sellé, named himself my wolof professor and tutored me for a few hours every day. a lot of the little kids (who don't speak french very well yet) would come by and would practice with me, and soon everyone in the house was talking to me in wolof. it was a bit frustrating at first, but now i can actually say some stuff and can pick out words in people's conversations. it's been a much different way to learn a language than i've ever had... i'm learning to use it rather than be tested on it, but i kinda like this way better. wolof is going to be very important for me to get involved with the people here, so i'm really excited to keep it going. on antoher note, i spent a lot of time playing with the adorable kids in the family- the one in the picture below, nafatou, was my favorite. she would smile at me every time i ever came near her and it was only a few seconds before i could get her laughing really hard. ahh she was so cute.
most of the kids loved me, except for one. she still cries whenever i get too close...
while i was there, i was reminded a lot that they considered me a part of their family now. that i was at "chez moi" (my house) and it was really nice to be embraced by the family.
it was really fun also to have some girls my age to connect with even though we have totally different backgrounds. aissatou, fatou and sophie and i all got along really well-- my new senegalese sisters. aissatou is really short, but she's older than me- so i became her big little sister, whereas sophie (in the picture below) is a lot taller than me but younger, so i became her little big sister. but all in all, it was really interesting to talk about our cultures, our interests, and learn from and relate to each other.
even though i learned to speak some wolof and was wearing senegalese clothes everyday, aissatou wanted to take it one step further and braid my hair, so her and sophie attacked my hair on my last night and one hour later i had a head full of braids. i'm not going to lie though, it's much more convenient than trying to wash your hair with a bucket shower (you don't realize the convenience of shower heads and running water til you don't have it)
and here are my new senegalese mama's-- from left to right, mama fatou, mama dieye and mama ami (the two on either side of me are the one's i'm named after)
i'm so happy that i got a chance to get out of dakar and actually feel like i was getting to learn and understand and participate in senegalese culture. it made me really excited for the year ahead once i get some structure in working with disabilities. this coming monday is another holiday in kaolack, gamou wat to celebrate mohammed's baptism (in the muslim religion, the baptism is exactly 7 days after the birth) and i'm mostly likely headed back this weekend to see everyone again. i'm excited!
gamou is the celebration of the prophet mohammed's birthday, so it's a pretty big deal. apparently people come from all over the world to kaolack to celebrate it. the mosque was all lit up and there were a lot of people in town. most of my time was spent in the house with the family, but people stopped in all day to visit. there were also a lot of gambians there (aissatou has family in gambia too-- it's the country that is surrounded by senegal) and apparently they speak english as a second language in gambia and french in senegal and wolof to each other, so i had a fun time trying to remember who was senegalese and who was gambian so that i would speak the right language to them. i saw a lot of confused faces as people waited for me to realize i was speaking to wrong language. on a really exciting note, i learned a lot of wolof in my few days there. one of the family members, sellé, named himself my wolof professor and tutored me for a few hours every day. a lot of the little kids (who don't speak french very well yet) would come by and would practice with me, and soon everyone in the house was talking to me in wolof. it was a bit frustrating at first, but now i can actually say some stuff and can pick out words in people's conversations. it's been a much different way to learn a language than i've ever had... i'm learning to use it rather than be tested on it, but i kinda like this way better. wolof is going to be very important for me to get involved with the people here, so i'm really excited to keep it going. on antoher note, i spent a lot of time playing with the adorable kids in the family- the one in the picture below, nafatou, was my favorite. she would smile at me every time i ever came near her and it was only a few seconds before i could get her laughing really hard. ahh she was so cute.
most of the kids loved me, except for one. she still cries whenever i get too close...
while i was there, i was reminded a lot that they considered me a part of their family now. that i was at "chez moi" (my house) and it was really nice to be embraced by the family.
it was really fun also to have some girls my age to connect with even though we have totally different backgrounds. aissatou, fatou and sophie and i all got along really well-- my new senegalese sisters. aissatou is really short, but she's older than me- so i became her big little sister, whereas sophie (in the picture below) is a lot taller than me but younger, so i became her little big sister. but all in all, it was really interesting to talk about our cultures, our interests, and learn from and relate to each other.
even though i learned to speak some wolof and was wearing senegalese clothes everyday, aissatou wanted to take it one step further and braid my hair, so her and sophie attacked my hair on my last night and one hour later i had a head full of braids. i'm not going to lie though, it's much more convenient than trying to wash your hair with a bucket shower (you don't realize the convenience of shower heads and running water til you don't have it)
and here are my new senegalese mama's-- from left to right, mama fatou, mama dieye and mama ami (the two on either side of me are the one's i'm named after)
i'm so happy that i got a chance to get out of dakar and actually feel like i was getting to learn and understand and participate in senegalese culture. it made me really excited for the year ahead once i get some structure in working with disabilities. this coming monday is another holiday in kaolack, gamou wat to celebrate mohammed's baptism (in the muslim religion, the baptism is exactly 7 days after the birth) and i'm mostly likely headed back this weekend to see everyone again. i'm excited!
Thursday, March 5, 2009
back to square 1...almost
my first few days in dakar have been pretty good- the city is unlike any i've seen, mostly because it's so incredibly sandy here! we're surrounded by ocean, but i didn't think that'd mean that i'd be walking on sand on the sidewalks. it's not a problem, except when the wind blows. i've been staying with olivia still, she's been really welcoming and really helpful in terms of getting my first handle of this place. her apartment is a bit outside of downtown, so the other day i felt adventurous and decided to get myself downtown and try to find the beach. i even took the bus to get there-- which i was very proud of, and managed to navigate downtown using my lonely planet map. downtown was pretty busy and noisy as i guess is to be expected, but i was really driven to find the water. eventually, i figured my way around and found it- this picture is my first glimpse of the water in dakar, and my first real accomplishment here.
it was pretty beautiful, especially for its proximity to downtown. the water was still turquoise. much of the beach front property is expensive hotels and restaurants, but it was still a nice view.
senegal is a muslim country-- i haven't seen too much yet, but i can hear music from mosques once in a while and i've caught a few people praying towards mecca on the street. also, some of the men where islamic style clothing and some women are veiled.
i had my first real interaction with senegalese people (apart from olivia's boyfriend, babakar) yesterday when i met ame, one of the people working in disabilities linked to ashoka. he invited me to his house and i met some of his family, and we talked a lot about the stuff i could do while i'm here. his wife, adiabi, made a traditional senegalese dish, chebu jenn (fish rice) for lunch, which she said she would teach me to cook too! meal culture is really unique here, all the food is served on one dish in the middle, and everyone eats from it! no separate plates. also, you can't drink anything during the meal, only afterwords. thankfully, we had spoons, but i've been warned by olivia that that's not always the case- sometimes people eat with their hands! that'll be an experience i'm sure. ame and adiabi have a 2 month old daughter malika who is adorable. she's got the pudgiest cheeks ever. i also met a cousin of the family (i forget her name) and she took me to the market to get the stuff to make lunch- the market was fine, except for when we bought the fish and this woman was throwing around scales and fish guts like nobody's business. thankfully i avoided getting hit. apart from that, i'm pretty excited about the prospect of working with disabilities here- i'm going to be meeting some other people in the next week who can help me too. apparently there's a school for kids with disabilities nearby that i'd like to check out too. ame is working on a website to organize information about efforts to help disabled all over senegal, but any photos/information/videos that i accumulate on my travels this year can be used to help his site. otherwise, he seems really willing to bring me in to the stuff he works on here so i get a better understanding of disability issues here and the people working to improve it. dakar's not bad, but i still am drawn out of the big city. i wouldn't mind trying out a few projects in this area, but i also might talk to handicap international to try to get involved in projects that are more out there in the countryside. i'm excited to get things moving in the right direction! i haven't started any wolof classes yet, but i got a few words. i'm hoping to find a tutor or something, but it's hard with my plans so all over the place. we'll see though! my french is serving me well thus far. and i really like senegalese food too, so i'm pretty optimistic :) hopefully i'll have more things to report soon!
it was pretty beautiful, especially for its proximity to downtown. the water was still turquoise. much of the beach front property is expensive hotels and restaurants, but it was still a nice view.
senegal is a muslim country-- i haven't seen too much yet, but i can hear music from mosques once in a while and i've caught a few people praying towards mecca on the street. also, some of the men where islamic style clothing and some women are veiled.
i had my first real interaction with senegalese people (apart from olivia's boyfriend, babakar) yesterday when i met ame, one of the people working in disabilities linked to ashoka. he invited me to his house and i met some of his family, and we talked a lot about the stuff i could do while i'm here. his wife, adiabi, made a traditional senegalese dish, chebu jenn (fish rice) for lunch, which she said she would teach me to cook too! meal culture is really unique here, all the food is served on one dish in the middle, and everyone eats from it! no separate plates. also, you can't drink anything during the meal, only afterwords. thankfully, we had spoons, but i've been warned by olivia that that's not always the case- sometimes people eat with their hands! that'll be an experience i'm sure. ame and adiabi have a 2 month old daughter malika who is adorable. she's got the pudgiest cheeks ever. i also met a cousin of the family (i forget her name) and she took me to the market to get the stuff to make lunch- the market was fine, except for when we bought the fish and this woman was throwing around scales and fish guts like nobody's business. thankfully i avoided getting hit. apart from that, i'm pretty excited about the prospect of working with disabilities here- i'm going to be meeting some other people in the next week who can help me too. apparently there's a school for kids with disabilities nearby that i'd like to check out too. ame is working on a website to organize information about efforts to help disabled all over senegal, but any photos/information/videos that i accumulate on my travels this year can be used to help his site. otherwise, he seems really willing to bring me in to the stuff he works on here so i get a better understanding of disability issues here and the people working to improve it. dakar's not bad, but i still am drawn out of the big city. i wouldn't mind trying out a few projects in this area, but i also might talk to handicap international to try to get involved in projects that are more out there in the countryside. i'm excited to get things moving in the right direction! i haven't started any wolof classes yet, but i got a few words. i'm hoping to find a tutor or something, but it's hard with my plans so all over the place. we'll see though! my french is serving me well thus far. and i really like senegalese food too, so i'm pretty optimistic :) hopefully i'll have more things to report soon!
Monday, March 2, 2009
safe and sound in dakar
i just wanted to let everyone know i made it to dakar, senegal in the middle of the night last night! everything went remarkably smoothly and i'm staying with a girl from harvard, olivia, who is doing a fellowship in senegal too. it's nice to have a place to transition, but ideally i'll be finding a family to stay with while i'm here but the city's expensive and i have a feeling i'm going to adopt the same goal in madagascar of getting to the coast! we'll see :) time to run to lunch and change some money!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
