Senegal Nice, Life Takes VISA, and WAIST

I apologize for my blog neglect over the past month, but be assured that I used the time productively to learn new things about Agroforestry, take a short course in Pulaar (another language spoken in my area), socialize with my friends from training, and play some "serious" softball - details to come.

Now that my training is finished and I have "entered my community" from here on out it's just hard work. I get started as soon as I arrive in my village and won't stop until I get home in two years (except for my daily nap, of course).


Senegal Nice

While the Senegalese people can sometimes be aggressive and demanding for cadeaux (gifts), I have had two experiences over the past two weeks that attest to their honesty and hospitality.

Story #1: On my way from Kedougou to Thies for my In Service Training, I stopped to spend the night at the Peace Corps transit house in the city of Kaolack. My friend and I got a cab from where our car dropped us off to the house with all of our luggage. We unloaded everything at the house, but as the cab pulled away, I realized that I had left my day bag - with my iPod - in the back seat. My attempt to flag him down failed so I trekked back to the garage (car hub) and tried to find him again. After an hour of waiting around and talking to the other cabbies without any sign of the driver, I gave up and went back to the house.

At about 3:00 a.m. I woke up to the ringing door bell. Somebody shouted that a man was at the door for me. Groggy-eyed, I stumbled to the front of the house where the cabby stood and said, "I got all the way to my village, 35km away, and found your bag. I remembered your saying in the car that you were leaving first thing in the morning so I drove back to make sure you had all of your things."

Everything was still in the bag. I thanked the man and gave him whatever cash I had in my pocket. He humbly accepted the small tip and drove away.

Story #2: A couple weeks ago, thirteen of my friends and I took a quick one-night trip to the beach in Mbour, which is close to Thies. We arranged to have a house that would fit twenty people for the night. Upon arrival, though, we met the man with whom we had arranged lodging who showed us to the bedroom he had prepared - with a single bed. After a brief argument and a dramatic walkout, we had nowhere to stay. A few of us went to the grocery store to find supplies for the night while another group tried to find somewhere for us to stay. They wandered from hotel to hotel, asking about prices, but everything was either full or too expensive.

Then a man approached two members of our group and said, "Are you looking for somewhere to stay tonight?"

"Yes we are. We lost the house we had planned on staying in."

"Well you can stay in my house. I'll only charge you 100 dollars and I won't even be there, just my two nephews."

"100 dollars is way too much, I won't even consider it for more than 60."

"Deal."

So, while it seemed a little shady, we checked it out and were pleasantly surprised. The man had a brand new house that was completely gated in. In the backyard was a pool, and the back gate opened directly onto a sandy beach of the Atlantic. It seemed too good to be true. We went inside to a tastefully-designed living room and kitchen with cushy couches, a TV, and original pieces of artwork on the walls. Upstairs, a row of bench seats with pads bordered a hexagonal loft that opened to a westward-facing balcony. We put our beer in his fridge, cooked dinner in his kitchen, and had a happy hour as we watched the sunset over the ocean. Meanwhile, he went to Dakar for the evening, leaving us to the charge of his two nephews. One of his nephews was a professional djembé instructor (African drum) and gave a couple of us a lesson.

We spent the next day swimming, lying around, and throwing a football on the beach until we had to leave in the evening to make it back for training the next day. It amazed me that this man left 14 young Americans in his house to party and enjoy it, and for about 4 dollars a head.


Life Takes VISA

You may have seen a recent ad campaign from Visa with the slogan, Whatever you want to do in life, life takes VISA. I was going through a magazine with a teenager in my village, showing him the pictures, explaining who people were, etc., when we came across one of these ads. It had a picture of a vending machine with different countries' flags in the place of candy bars and chips. I translated the slogan to the kid and explained the concept of the ad. He's a smart kid who goes to school and so could grasp the idea, but he had one question: "What's Visa?"


WAIST

After completing my three weeks of In Service Training I went directly to the West African Invitational Softball Tournament (WAIST). Over 500 expats and Peace Corps volunteers from all over West Africa participate in the WAIST tournament, with both a competitive league and a social league. Festivities center around the American club, where players can swim, drink beer, and eat hot dogs between games. At night, parties and dances are planned, with a banquet and ball on the last night. It's the only time of the year that we get the chance to truly feel American. Americans living in Dakar put up the PCVs in homestays. I stayed with the Director of USAID with four other Senegal volunteers and five Gambian volunteers. He was incredibly welcoming and opened his home to us, even when we asked him to open it at 5:00 in the morning.

My team consisted of the volunteers from the Kedougou region and from our neighboring Tamba region. Historically, our team has not taken "winning" the tournament seriously, and has instead had some serious fun. Most teams wear T-shirts for jerseys. Our jersey theme this year was short jean shorts / red-neck. I can't help but say that we looked amazing (see pic at right), and even won our first game in four years. We rotated in new players every two innings to make sure everyone got a chance to play, bended the rules as often as possible, had a tunnel gauntlet for the opposing team at the end of every game, and even had a spontaneous dance party on second base in the middle of a game.

One volunteer referred to the day of our last game as "one of the best 37 days of my life," while others said it was the most fun they had ever had. In any case, we created memories that I will never lose. Only 358 days til next year's tournament...


Wolof Lesson of the Day

Wolof is the dominant language in Senegal. That said, with its speakers' exposure to western culture, a few English words and many French words have managed to sneak into every-day vernacular, particularly in the cities.

A phrase that embodies this melange of languages is "Dafa nice quoi!"

Dafa is a Wolof word meaning that is in English. Quoi meaning what that the French use at the end of a sentence to accentuate it. You all know nice. So a three-word phrase spoken every day in the urban areas of Senegal and understood by almost all of the urban inhabitants contains three different languages. I like that.


This entry will be the last you hear from me for a couple weeks. I'm headed out to the village until our regional retreat (all Kedougou volunteers get together to discuss our goals for the region) and an AgFo summit (all AgFo volunteers from Senegal get together to discuss strategies etc.) that are conveniently back-to-back.

Keep commenting, y'all've been slackin lately. And if I don't know you, definitely comment, I'm curious to see what kind of people are reading this.

Peace and Love,

Andy