Acquiring a Green Thumb

By joining Peace Corps, I knew I would be gaining an invaluable experience and learning new things over my service time. Those were some of my main reasons why I joined.  Never did I actually imagine that I would discover my inner green thumb just waiting to come out and garden.  As a small enterprise development volunteer, I didn't actually think that I would be doing anything with agriculture, or even small scale gardening.  I thought my work would be business related rek. But after being here for about a year, I realize that quite a bit of my work revolves around agriculture, especially living in the Kolda region: that's all we really got going on down here :)

So about a week and a half ago, I helped participate in another volunteers palm reforestation project in a few villages just outside of the city of Kolda.  I'm not an agroforestry volunteer, but I was more than excited about helping out! We helped superivse the planting of 2 different species of palm trees, and we helped ensure that proper protection measures were taken to avoid them being devoured by rampant goats, sheep, cows, etc. The project was a lot of fun, and it was nice to mix up my work by helping other volunteers in their projects.



Ally helping plant a palm tree



Some of the palm trees that we helped distribute out








I've also expressed my newly acquired green thumb by starting a small garden in my compound, next to my room.  Ally, my agroforestry volunteer gave me some trees: Papaya, Guava, Citrus, and an African Mahogany. My family and I planted the fruit trees in my garden along with a ton of moringa and the beautiful panté seeds I collected back in April (see former blog posts).  My brother Diouldé added some cucumbers (which get gigantic here!) and some onions.  Eventually we want to add some tomatos, and when the season is right we have lettuce and cabbage.  I love having a garden.  Before Peace Corps I never really had a desire to plant anything or maintain a garden.  The last time I actually tried growing stuff back in America was probably when I was 5 years old and I planted a peach pit in my backyard because I wanted a peach tree.  Of course it didn't grow in Arizona, probably from the fact that I only watered it on the day I planted it, then never again.  Peace Corps has brought out my inner green thumb! I love watching the seeds I planted grow, and now our yard is beautiful! No longer just a burnt garbage pile.  I've decided that when I return after my service I will always have a garden. I also want to continue to plant trees.  Trees are amazing! It'll probably be a little easier having a garden in America too because we don't have to worry about it being eaten by wandering animals, which is often the case here.
 I take comfort in the fact that my host family will benefit from this small garden, even after I leave. I love that they actively help in taking care of the garden and are excited about it :)

The beginnings of our compound garden...