Thursday, November 20, 2008

la rhume

11/20/2008

Hi Folks,

Its been too long since i've written and this is going to be short so sorry bout that. I seem to have attrapp-ed la rhume (that pure franglais baby...it means i have a cold) and possibly an eye infection, so here i am, the un-healthy health volunteer spouting health advice to people and sniffling. I'm told its the "saison du vent" (windy season) and everyone gets sick now, which certainly seems to be the truth given that its been insanely ridiculously windy all day every day for the past week, and everyone at my house has the sniffles (these things travel fast in the land of the communal cup, bowl, tea casse, everything). Its also evidently the season of eye infections, i was warned, i reluctantly gave up my contacts and picked up my sunglasses so that now i stumble around in blurry darkness, and still i seem to have a slight unhappiness in my left eye. It's not hard to see how this could have come about in a land where waste management doesn't really exist and its not uncommon to find both the feces and the bones of various animals in any given square foot of ground, when the winds pick up its not just sand they're blowing in your eyes if you know what i mean.

Still, its hard not to remain positive in the land of so many friends! I have millions of friends, i made three more on the way here. I made three friends, received one dinner invitation, and was told twice by random people that they will be returning to the US with me. A friend came over last night, he was a friend of my host brothers first but now i think he might come over half to see my brother and half to pester me, and he told me that i read too much and need to talk all the time so that i will speak pulaar in two months. Why you ask? So we can get married of course! A friend found me on my way to work yesterday and invited me to his house, me and any other white female friends i might like to bring along. I have gotten 4 business cards, 3 phone numbers, 2 dinner invitations, and a partridge in a pair tree since the last time i wrote an email. Everyone is just so friendly! Its weird though, they all seem to be men. Okay, so i'm not really this naive, i get phone numbers because i refuse to give out mine, i get dinner invitations for my friends because i refuse to go and they think if i can bring a friend i'll be more likely to come, and i never actually got a partridge in a pear tree through it would have been a nice gesture. Its not easy to make female friends here, mostly because the women work constantly, and the mens sole household chore seems to be making tea, the nature of which is purely social anyway. I drink 15 or so tiny cups of tea a day and talk in some interesting combination of languages with men during all my free time. This has been very informative and from our talks i have learned how to effectively stave off marriage proposals, at least for the time being. I HATE KIDS. that all you have to say. Men here want wives for the sole purpose of keeping their house and raising their children and as i am an american who can barely wash clothes let alone cook who doesn't want children, i am virtually unwanted...unless i can bring them to the states with me, then they might be willing to compromise. I love getting all womens rightsy on them, evoking the children debate and reminding them that as men than can have no possible comprehension of what childbirth is like and therefore have no right to tell me i have to have children, men here aren't used to women who stand up for themselves. "No babies for me, no thank you" works better than "I have a finace" or "i'm married" here. Interesting.

Thats all for now,
I have to go do some work or something now, Love and miss you all!

Shelby

Friday, November 7, 2008

"Taxi-ing"

11.05.2008

Hi Folks!

FIRST I need to say HAPPY (slightly belated) BIRTHDAY TO BECCA! 22! Hope it was fantastic! This winter we’ve been friends for 20 years, TWENTY YEARS! I love you and I miss you! Have a fantastic 22nd year; I’ll see you sometime during our 23rd!

So here I am, back in Selibaby, after my first real taxi brousse experience out to Gouraye to watch Levin and Sam make a very successful school garden at the elementary school there. Tabitha, Sari, and I, all came along so that we could pretend to be real volunteers with actual projects for a day. The trip out was my first time riding taxi brusse, and it went well, I’m told. Of course I had no idea as I had nothing to compare it to and I found it rather uncomfortable and a touch crowded (14 people in the back of a small pick up truck, 4 in the cab, 1 on top of the cab). I was tucked snugly in the back of the truck bed with the other 13 people back there and all their luggage, sitting on my backpack and listening to my old i-pod, who unfortunately broke again about half way though the trip. As far as I was concerned it was a touch too snug back there for my liking, considering we left at a steamy 11:30 in the morning and drove through all the hottest hours of the day and successfully sweated off all of my sunscreen and got a nice rosy glow on the top of my nose, which is now peeling off, but the others assured me that I was very happy with the situation, evidently there are frequently many more people stuffed into the truck bed, though I don’t see how that would be possible with out sardine stile stacking. At any rate, it was a beautiful scenic drive, we made good time, and we only had to get out and walk once where the road got rocky and the driver thought we might pop the tires with all that weight.

Once in Gouraye we commenced with the school garden, and it was really inspiring. About 20 students came with 2 teachers and took turns doing everything that needed to be done to prepare the beds and seed them. I took about 12 billion pictures, so keep your eyes out for those because I’m going to do my darndest to post them ASAP.

The whole thing too only about 2 hours and left us the afternoon to wander on foot out to Sounatu, a little Pulaar village where the boys needed to check on some trees they had planted. This was what Levin described as a 40 minute walk, which turned out to be just over an hour, but to be fair we took our time, taking pictures and visiting with some random French tourists we met along the way who are driving their way across Africa for no apparent reason. It was a beautiful walk and we saw shepherds with flocks of sheep and goats, a giant lizard, some snake trails in the sand, huge seasonal lakes filled with lily pads, and the always beautiful Senegal River, on the other side of which loomed the always illusive Senegal where they have things like paved roads and beer…jerks. The village was adorable, with all sorts of baby animals and cute kids trailing behind us wherever we went and picking the burs out of my skirt for me when I tried to do it for myself. The walk back sucked a bit, considering it was 1:00 pm when we left and it was hotter than hell outside. Just to put this in perspective, when we got back the t-shirt I was wearing was not only fairly thoroughly soaked in sweat, but it was also crusted with salt from all the sweat that the hot wind dried while I was en route. Gross right? Sorry, it was necessary to share that.

So that brings us to the trip back, taxi brusse ride numero deux pour moi (I’m so good at French!) and this one started out a little worse and ended a little better if you can believe it. (OK here’s where everyone who’s easily excitable when it comes to my personal safety should just skip ahead to the next paragraph…that’s you Dad). This time the taxi picked us up at the house we were staying at and was already packed and ready to go, the truck was a bit smaller than the first one and the entire truck bed was packed with luggage secured in place with a rope net with 8 people sitting on it already, 3 on one side with their legs hanging off the edge, a woman and her two small children in the middle, and 2 on the top of the cab. We had about 5 minutes to clamber on, and secure ourselves with all of our luggage before the truck started moving. I was sitting facing the back with my legs curled under the bumper, clinging to the net for dear life with my purse on my lap and some nice gentleman on the top of the cab was wearing my backpack backwards. I’m not going to lie, I was a bit scared. The roads are uneven deep sandy ruts through fields of dry grass sprinkled with scrubby trees covered with sharp thorns and our driver didn’t really seem to be taking his time (we were probably going about 30 mph, but it feels like a lot more when your on the bed of a truck with your legs flapping in the breeze). Anyway when we got going and I adjusted a little I started to feel much better and by the end of the trip it felt more like an amusement park ride than a taxi and we were all laughing at poor Tabitha who got the seat facing backwards on the middle of the tailgate and was literally caked with dust on every exposed surface, it really was hilarious. They dropped us right at Kim’s door and it was no hassle at all to get our luggage because ours had never been secured under the net anyway so no one even had to get off the truck. Fantabulous!

As fun as it all was, I think I’ll avoid taxi brusse whenever possible during the rest of my time here (aka be a giant homebody and just sit around here in good old Selibaby, which is just fine with me).

That brings us to election day, and the election day party. We had big plans (a bag of brownie mix and several Michael Moore movies to make us good and angry at the current administration and dreams of cold drinks and pita sandwiches from a local restaurant) which turned out to be a bit of a bust as the electricity had apparently been out since we left for gouraye the day before and no one had any cold anything, pita man didn’t have any pitas, and our little oven doesn’t work without electricity. As stubborn as I am, I refused to give up on the brownies though, so I tried and succeeded at making a brusse oven (a pot of sand with a lid over a gas burner that kind of unevenly cooks everything you put in it) and made a decent batch of alright brownies, with only one minor setback, the “oven” got so hot it heated up the whole little gas stove, melted off the knobs, and burned the hell out of our already disgusting pot holders, but everyone agreed that it was a worthwhile trade for brownies. Shortly thereafter the power came back on and we went out and got salads instead of pitas and I made another batch of much more successful brownies with caramel swirls, cookies and cream and chocolate instant pudding, and Luis came over with his internet and laptop and we kept up with election polls until I passed out at around 11:30. All in all a good night, oh, and kitty had kittens, 3, we named one Obama. Perfect. Now I must go because I am writing this on my laptop at Kim’s and its after 6, which is my self imposed curfew because I like to spend the evenings learning Pulaar with the fam, plus I think they get a little sad when I spend all day at Kim’s with other Americans. Every time I go back at the end of the day they say I’ve been gone for 4 months and have probably forgotten all my Pulaar and French because of all the English I spoke while I was gone. I don’t want that to happen! So here I go! Much love and happy thoughts! Dad, try not to think too much about the taxi brusse, its just part of life here, and besides I’m fine! Love you all!

Shelby