Sukundu ma weydi???

One thing I love about living in Senegal, is the ability to change your hairstyle drastically, and people will continue to tell you that you are beautiful! It's great! Things most people (especially us females) would probably be extremely hesistant about trying out is actually well accepted here in Senegal.  Is it because we fear the harsh judgement or looks of critisism from our fellow Americans that we feel like we can't change our appearances in an extreme manner? Or is it just that we get a free pass here in Senegal for being a "toubab" where being a volunteer and trying something "Senegalese", or extreme, in a sense, is quite amusing and hilarious?  Or maybe we are tired of feeling yucky all the time from the high temperatures of the hot and dry season that doing something completely different from our "ordinary look" will give us a nice jolt of energy? :) Whatever the underlying reason happens to be, I guess, really doesn't matter because I have bad ass hair, and I LOVE it! 





The story starts out with Ally, (one of my BFFs in country) who was tired of her beautiful, long blonde hair. And with the hot and dry season among us, Ally decided that instead of trying to mess with getting shampoo out of her lovely locks during a bucket bath, or brushing through the tangles we all get from the lack of conditioner, that it would be best to just shave it all off her head. We went to a local hair salon (for boys) and the town of Goundaga's baker/barber/mason shaved off her hair in Kounkane because we have electricity here! :) Ally wanted to rock a mohawk because let's face it, she can here in Senegal, and people love it! Which is precisely what happened.  When Ally and I walked out of the barber shop, all the people around us just stared, but she began to get comments such as "Sukunu ma weydi!" which means your hair is beautiful :) And it is!  Ally is a bad ass for being able to rock a mohawk with such elegance :) 



As much as I wanted to shave my head, I decided to have my sister, Ndiole, braid bright red yarn into my hair.  It was inspired from Ally's avatar costume when she had purple yarn braided into hers.  It took my sister 4 hours! But she is the best hair braider in Kounkane, and it was well worth it! I have literally an entire roll of red yarn tied into my long hair, but it gives me some volume. Everyone also tells me I'm beautiful.  Gotta love that, especially when I feel gross and ugly every day. I have to say that I really enjoy experimenting with different hairstyles here in Senegal; I haven't worked up the courage to shave all of it off yet but I'll keep y'all posted on the next major hair alterations Ally and I decide to do! :) Bisous! xxx

Ally and I with our new hair :)

  

April Adventures....

Sorry for the delay in blog posts.  I've been really busy for once.  For starters, I'd like to say Happy Belated Easter, even though, it is "Easter Monday" according to my calendar so I think I can still count today as part of the holiday.  Everyone else in Senegal is, so why can't I? :)
Instead of Easter egg hunts and chocolate bunnies, I spent my Easter holiday with my best friend Ally.  We decided to go to one of the 2 churches here in Kounkané.  We have one catholic church and one evangelistic chruch here, and Ally and I went to the one of which the location we knew.  It ended up being the evangelistic church.  Apparently this church has only 5 members, only 1 of which actually came to the "service".  The church service started out with the guardian, who lived next to the church unlocking the doors for Ally and me.  We sat in the small red church with a glass cross in the back of the room and 6 benches filling up the middle of it.  It was so much different from the churches in America, which isn't surprising with 98% of this country being muslim :) Ally and I sat on a bench to see if anyone else would show up.  We chatted, read a hymn book that was translated into pulaar, and finally 1 member of the church came to inform us that all 4 other members went to Velingara to the bigger service for Easter.  He then said a prayer for us in Pulaar, and he asked Alla/God to bless our families in America and in Senegal.  He also prayed for God/Alla to help us during our 2 year service in Senegal.  It was really nice of him to pray for everyone, especially because we just met him 5 minutes before the prayer.
We then spent the rest of the day working with bamboo and plywood trying to make a solar dryer (stay tuned for a future blog post on that).  Ally and I spent the evening eating one of my favorite dishes for dinner: leciri e maffe jambo :) Yum! Then we watched a few episodes of Weeds, season 3 on my laptop in my backyard (it's waaaayyy to hot to sit indoors during hot/dry season).  We accompanied our Weeds marathon with eating jelly beans from America, chocolate cream filled cookies from Turkey (Biskrem), and getting drunk off a bottle of terrible red wine from Senegal.  It was a great way to end the night :)

When I wasn't celebrating the Easter holiday, I spent the rest of April planning work for our girls conference, IT classes (inchallah), making a solar dryer, having girls' club meetings, eating a ton of mangos, celebrating passover with our 2 jewish volunteers in Koda (super fun!), and working on distributing a scholarship to some girls at the CEM (middle school) in Kounkané. Work. Work. Work. :) I'm so happy to have lots of stuff to do!
Also, this month I was thrown off my bike while I was riding through a busy market.  I collided with a walking female pedestrian who cut me off while I was biking, making me crash into the side of a donkey cart; therefore, throwing me over the handle bars, landing on my face, into a pile of vegetable that a woman was selling on the side of the street.  It was painfully embarrassing.  The people at the marché were super helpful! They picked me up (literally), poured water on my arms to wash off the dirt, asked if I was ok, they didn't even laugh in my face, which was surprising.  Looking back, a white girl flying off her bike into a vegetable pile after hitting a donkey cart is quite hilarious!
Fortunately, I didn't brake anything, and the only remaining signs of my bike accident consist of large swollen bruises on my right leg that resemble beatings with a baseball bat, bruises on the upper half of my abdomen, a scratch on my nose, and the nickname "Air Diaobe" which my family gave to me after I told them the story of me soaring through the air (Diaboe is the city where I crashed) hahahaha! Always wear a helmet while biking! :) over and out....

Seeds!

On my usual, (almost daily) trip to the Case Foyer de Femmes I make every morning I decided to switch up my normal routine. Usually I head to the Case, chat with my friend, Fall, chat with the directrice, Salimatu, hang out with the girls who go to school there, and sometimes I even try to instigate some future planning for formations there with Salimatu, which usually goes nowhere. But one morning last week, I did something quite different. In fact, you could say I even did some cross sector work. :) I, a small enterprise development volunteer, decided to collect seeds :) hahaha! It's kind of a joke around PC Senegal that SEDers aren't "really" volunteers because we usually live in bigger cities, have electricity, and fairly consistent access to wifi and good reseau unlike many village volunteers. But as a Peace Corps family, us volunteers share information and learn many different things from those working in different sectors.  I, for instance, learned from my neighbor Allyson, who is an AgroForestry volunteer, who primarily works with trees, that moringa seeds are ready for collection when the seed pods turn brown. 

So noticing that the Case Foyer de Femmes had 3 moringa trees with tons of brown seed pods, I decided to collect as many seeds as I could to give to Ally and contribute to our Kolda house seed bank, that way any volunteer in need of moringa seeds could just go to the seed bank and there would be plenty available. I spent a good amount of time shaking the trunks of trees to catch the falling seed pods, climbing the brick wall to try to get to the very high branches, and finally, (a trick I learned by watching Senegalese children), taking a large stick and hitting the pods off the middle branches of the trees that I couldn't quite reach even if I jumped.  It was quite hilarious because the pods would, oftentimes, break open and moringa seeds would fly out all over the ground like candy from a piñata, which I would happily pick up and put in my old oatmeal can :) It was a great morning!

On my seed collecting adventure, however, I stumbled across the most beautiful seeds I've ever seen! While waving my stick around in the air and hitting brown moringa pods off the branches, I accidentally hit a neighboring tree with larger pods causing one to fly off, and upon landing, burst open on the ground revealing 5 large Fuchsia colored seeds. I was taken aback by the exquisite beauty of these seeds.  Out of excitement of my new discovery I went to show my friend, Fall, and he explained to me that it is a seed that requires a lot of water, and he suggested I wait to plant them right before rainy season.  I happily continued to collect all the reachable seed pods off the tree because I was so excited about my beautiful new seeds that I found.

Some of the pretty seeds I collected

When I came home, I showed the seeds to my family.  I learned that the seeds are called "panté" in pulaar, and they grow into a flowery vine of yellow and green.  The plant sounds just as beautiful as the seeds! I also learned that pulaar kids like to collect the seeds sometimes in order to use them to play games, and local "witch doctors" (maribous) sometimes bless them and hand them out to people to protect from evil spirits.  I, personally, have never seen any seeds more beautiful than these! Before moving to Senegal, I never would have thought a day would come where I would get so much enjoyment from finding seeds.  They are just so exotic looking :)

Panté seeds

American Exchange student visits Kounkané

So one of the Peace Corps goals promotes helping Americans understand the people and cultures of other countries. For me personally, that means informing the people of America (and other countries--I have international blog readers :)) about Senegal and Senegalese culture.  This month I did some work to contribute to this P.C. goal by hosting an American exchange student.  :) Her name is Renée, and she is a student studying abroad in Dakar for the Spring 2011 semester.  She came down to Kolda for a 5 day visit to see what life is like for Senegalese people in this region, and also to learn a little bit about what a Peace Corps Senegal volunteer's life is like. 



Renée hangin out in my hut! :)

We had a great five days! We spent some time making posters for our Kounkané girls club that myself and two other volunteers run every wednesday, and we went to the lycée and hung up the posters to get more girls to come to our meetings. :) Renée and I spent a lot of time talking to people around my town; we practiced our Pulaar (She learned a little in the 5 days being in Pulaar country!) and also a bit of Wolof.  We went to a formation that taught basic business principles to local entrepreneurs taught by my counterpart, and we spent an entire day in a "real village", meaning we biked out to Goundaga (Ally's village) and spent the day playing games with the children and eating kodé (millet couscous), yum! :) We also celebrated my brother Djouldé's birthday by buying him a cake and boisson mix similar to Kool-Aid...oh and Renée bought my family a chicken for dinner so they slaughtered it and made us a delicous dinner of chicken on a bed of fresh lettuce, tomatos, green bell pepper, boiled eggs, and fried potatos drizzled with a delicious onion-y yassa sauce...now that's a patron dinner :)
Renée already had a really good understanding of Senegalese culture because she has been living here for 2 months, but it was nice to share with someone the projects I've been working on and the potential projects I'm in the process of starting.  She even brought me some delicious dark chocolate as sillafonda (gifts) from Dakar, but with the weather now being in the hot/dry season, it melted.  We ate the chocolate with a spoon! :) Can't waste it; it's Chocolate!



Melted Sillafonda, delicious nevertheless!

Until the next blog posting.....besos! xxx

Donkey Rally to Fight Malnutrition in Kolda!

So a little over a week ago, myself and many other volunteers in the Kolda region ended a week long project to create awareness about malnutrition and educate people about the benefits of moringa (aka: Neebedai).  I mentioned the project in an earlier blog post including the promotional video for the project :) I hope you all checked it out!

The project officially kicked off on March 9th, 2011 in my town of Kounkane.  The original volunteer who started planning the project was med evacuated before he could participate in it, so that left my site mate, Geoff in charge :) Unfortunately for me, on the day the donkey race started I was battling sickness due to parasites and amoebas, so I was unable to leave with the donkey riders and bikers that accompanied them.  I later joined the volunteers working with this project towards the end of the rally. Lucky for me I recovered in time to help out with a few of the sensibilizations, primarily the ones we did starting in Bagadagi and ending in Kolda ( I helped hold the sign :)).  

Basically, the project consisted of four donkey riders: Geoff, Mike, Curtis, and Cara (later in the rally, it was Charlene)  They switched between a mixture of riding the donkeys and walking the donkeys, because lets face it, riding a donkey all day would be extremely painful. 



The donkey riders!

The entire rally lasted 7 days. The donkey riders walked from Kounkane to Kolda, which is over 100K! Props to them! Especially because it's getting hotter and hotter every day! There were many other volunteers that helped out, who rode our bikes ahead of the donkey riders to help set up the sensibilizations (meetings held in the community to educate people) in the cities, towns, and villages we hit on our way to Kolda. 



Me, Cara, Wilma, and Mike watching the sensibilization

The sensibilizations were great! There were lots of people who showed up too! :) The meetings consisted of quizzing the audience on basic nutrition of the local foods.  Geoff and our Senegalese friends, like Mamadou, who helped out with the meetings were great!  The audience really interacted in answering questions, and those who responded were given moringa seeds! The audience learned what foods they eat on a regular basis contain the basic nutrients our bodies need, like protein, carbs, vitamins, etc. and of course the detriments of eating too many things with high fat content (oil, butter, etc). 



Geoff and Mamadou running the sensibilization

Finally, the audience was educated on a locally grown and widely available plant: Moringa.  They learned about all the nutrients this one plant contains and the importance of incorporating it into their diet to help fight against malnutrition, which is unfortunately something that is prevalent in many villages in our region and all over Senegal. 

Me and Charlene holding up the sign about Moringa during one of the sensibilizations



I feel like the donkey rally was very successful! It was great to see the audience interact and learn about Moringa and its many benefits! A great big thank you, Merci beaucoup, and Jaraama buy to all those who supported this effort and those who contributed monetarily :) It means the world to us when we know we have people out there who support our projects! Thank you!

Please feel free to check out the link below to learn more about this miracle plant! :)

http://www.moringa.com/

Big Thanks to Curtis! ---I borrowed many of your photos from fb! Jaraama :)

Parasite Hell

So this blog post is going to be a little more sombre than the past ones.....As much as I love Peace Corps and living in Senegal, I still have my days where it's incredibly difficult for me, and I end up having break downs or really low points during my service. I've had 3 breakdowns in country so far.  Once was during training when I had this awful skin discoloration on my face.  I thought the sun was destroying me and I had a tearful breakdown that involved the whole family staring at me through my bedroom door and window. I later learned that I had a fungus on my face; therefore, causing the ugly discoloration. Ugh. Boo rainy season.  My second breakdown occurred in January, where everyone I talked to that day about potential projects asked me for money to finance their business endeavors, and I was chastised and treated with hostility when I explained that I wasn't a bank and do not hand out money, but rather, I share knowledge.  And the third was a little over a week ago, last wednesday, when I had the worst sisck day so far.  Parasite hell, as I like to refer to it....literally the worst day of my life in Senegal so far.  So as a means of therapy for me, I'd like to share some of the things that really bother me here in Senegal....
#1: Little Children who yell "toubako" at me: When i walk by or ride my bike down the street, oftentimes, I hear "Toubako".  It really means "white person" but it's really annoyinng to be screamed at repeadetly, day after day. (Most of the kids in Kounkane are much better about calling me Salimatu (my senegalese name)).  There are still those disobediant kids, however, who continue to call me "toubako" out of spite, or even worse, "toube haako", which is a derogatory/racial slur translating close to asswipe or asshole.  My solution? I tell the kids what my name is here (Salimatu Balde) and then I make them greet me.  Worst case senario: I bought a machete and i carry it around Kounkane sometimes. I tell the kids that if they call me "toubako" again, then I'm gonna hit them with it.  I really wouldn't, and I hardly ever carry around my machete unless I'm using it for work, but I like to make a joke about hitting goats and bad children when people ask why I have a machete.
#2: People asking me for stuff: I hate when people ask me for money or to buy them stuff.  Again, it's mostly bad children who I don't know, who will come up to me and ask me to buy them candy or give them 100cfa.  Even adults ask me for stuff.  I have a woman who hangs out around the garage and asks me to buy her a sac of rice at least once a week.  I usually hear, "Give me your cellphone" or "Hey Toubako, give me money." multiple times a day depending on where I am...(it's getting better in Kounkane because people know i live here).  I usually ignore these demands, and sometimes on a good day I will turn it into a joke and ask for something of theirs.  One time a child on a donkey cart was riding by me, and he yelled, "Hey toubako, give me your cellphone!" and I said, "Only if you give me your donkey first!" And we all laughed and that was the end of it. But some days, it just wears on you, and making a joke seems like too much work.
#3: People who tell me I can't speak Pulaar: I hate when people tell me I can't speak their language.  I honestly think it's their way of trying to encourage me, but I find it to be so rude.  There are 2 women who everytime I see them, they tell me I can't speak Pulaar. Pointing out the obvious and making people feel ashamed of it, is so common here...stuff like that is not acceptable back home.  I think that's why I have a hard time with it? I usually have to restrain myself from being bitch-y back by asking them whether or not they can read, or telling them that they speak French horribly....It's just frustrating sometimes....
#4: Weight Gain: Oh my God, my biggest issue here.  I never thought I would move to Africa and gain weight.  It's quite ironic to me.  But leave it to me to come to Senegal and in the 7 months I've been here, I've gained an unwanted/estimated 10 pounds! Yes, 10! FML. This is the most I've ever weighed in my entire life, and it's a hard thing to deal with :(  I feel I can contribute this horrible event to 2 possibilities: 1: I was very active in the States and I ate a very healthy and balanced diet, which I no longer have the luxury to do here and 2: The diet here is just straight carbs and fat--only.  My solution? I'm trying to be more active and exercise despite the heat and frequent guests who come to visit me in Kounkane (who cut into Sam's workout time--boo!). I may also start cooking myself to control what I eat.
#5: Illness: And last, but certainly not least is Illness, which I blame my 3rd breakdown on.  The biggest issue I've had has been parasites and it technically wasn't officially diagnosed.  For the last 2 months I've been bloated all the time and nausiated every time after I eat.  Not cool.  I talked with the PC doctors, sent in a stool sample that went M.I.A. (scary) and had to do a second one a month later that never made it up to Dakar thanks to a careless PCVL, which finally ended in a puke fest and a 3 day fasting period.  Let's just say, I couldn't keep any food down, including fluids, I was burping sulfur, and if I wasn't vomitting, I was (excuse the crudeness) shitting  bloody, green water.  Yes, worst day of my life in Senegal.  Solution? On-call PC doctors saved me! I took 3 rounds of Fasigyne over a 3 day period, drank disgusting rehydration packets, and slept for pretty much 3 days straight. Diagnosis? Giardia (known from the infamous sulfur burps)  and Amoebas! Read about the crazy things I had living in me! : http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/giardia/ and http://www.scienceclarified.com/Al-As/Amoeba.html
I am much better now, thanks to meds and rest :) But all these factors, over time of course, put me in such a bitter mood this week, I just had to get some of this off my chest. Thanks for letting me rant...and I would like to add that I love being a Peace Corps volunteer and I'm extremely happy in Senegal! I wouldn't change any of this experience.  Some days these things just really get to me. Next blog post should be much more positive :) Thanks for reading!
Love.
xxx

Mural at the Case de Tout Petits

So it's March now....I've been here for almost seven months! Wow! Go me! I have finally completed a project.  It was a very small, side project, but it was very fun.  When I first installed at my site, I spent about a month going around Kounkane and introducing myself to people and organizations. I had spent a lot of my first month at the Case Foyer de Femmes and Case de Tout Petits (they are technically the same building) getting to know the employees and students that attend the school.  One of the things that was requested from me at the Case de tout petits (daycare equivalent) was an alphabet so that the students could learn the French letters.  So in February, I started the mural at the daycare.  I did an alphabet with a picture on each letter, and I also did the numbers one through ten with pictures that correspond to the amount of the number.  It was my first mural I've ever done, and I had a lot of fun doing it!  Unfortunately for me, I was never blessed with the ability to draw well.  The number mural I did all by myself, so I only painted things I knew I could draw somewhat decent, like clouds and smiley faces.  To my embarrassment, the students still really didn't know what some of the pictures were.  They didn't know what the clouds were, or smiley faces (I told them they were balls), the hearts or the flowers too. Wow! But I have to say my chickens and butterflies came out quite nicely.  The students also call the apple a mango or sometimes an orange. hahaha! It's pretty amusing.

The number mural I painted! :)

For the alphabet mural, I had to bring in some help.  Again, with limited drawing skills I had no idea how I was going to be able to draw animals?  So my friend Charlene, and fellow volunteer from Saare Abadou came to Kounkane for 2 days and helped me draw and paint the alphabet mural.  Charlene is very talented!  Our mural is beautiful and the kids loved it!  They like to look at it and name the things in the pictures :) Thanks Charlene, I couldn't have done it without you!

Charlene showin off our mural!

 I am so proud of our work! But two murals was enough for me.  I had a lot of fun spending a few days painting (it was slightly theraputic), but in the end, it's a lot of work, especially for someone like myself who is creatively challenged :) I really think the kids will get some good use out of it, inchallah :) So one project down, and many many more to start.  Getting started is the hardest part :)  Until the next post..... Happy March! :)

Yea! Me and the alphabet mural!