On Unproductivity

So right now, most everything that I have started or been working on has now imploded or a the least is in a holding pattern.

Some of this is a natural course of things: The school year ended in the way that school years here do, just sorta fizzled out without to much clear understanding of when or how till it was done. This means an actual end to the non actual work i was doing with the teachers there. Also this marks the end of any hope of getting my environmental club together til next year, though really all we were 'doing' was the school tree nursery.

That was were my biggest frustrations and most stressful interactions occured in the past couple months. Long story short, squirrels eat sprouts, especially lemon orange and papaya; kids are super impatient about growing things themselves and would rather rip sprouted seeds from the ground in effort to prove to me that they are not sprouting, despite my imploring them not to do this; if i am away from the garden, the gate will be left open; if i am away from site, the gate will be broken; if the gate is left open or broken, goats eat everything; some kids see order and take time and energy to push it into chaos; gardens make me insane.

My trash management trial fell more or less apart. Or at least the burn pit aspect of it. I will need to dig a new pit, dig it into harder clay, instruct people better as what to put in it, and generally get the local kids to work with me not against me. I did bury the glass and batteries. The location was ok, but otherwise, not super happy about it. Saved the metal and looking into a recycling pickup program. We have a ways to go before compost can enter into things.

Finally, the big news, the money came for my project. We all talked in the village and decided that it was clear we needed to wait 'boo ndiig ne a wata', for when the rains end. The one caveat to the whole deal is something that may or may not present itself as a big deal. It turns out my research was good for our budget except for in one critical area that i didnt really give much thought to, the currency conversion. I figured they would just give me the amount i asked for in local currency with the prices i have for things detailed in local currency. They however filled and sent the amount in dollars. This would be ok if the dollar hadent taken a massive nose-dive right after i sent in my proposal. Bottom line is i got ninety percent of what i asked for.

In all likelyhood this is not fatal. I am hoping that i can even just put up whatever money is needed out of the living allowance that the PC gives us each quarter. If there is any further issues about this i will let yall know but i am thinking that this may not be so terrible, i tried to estimate a little high in case things went awry, but getting that much less could be something. I will keep yall posted.

Anywho, somehting that is going well, our Seereer dictionary is finally in version one! I am super excited to have somehting in progress.

I have a million other things to write about, three other entries that i havent finished and a camera full of pictures i need to put up. Alas this month is not the one for me, maybe August i will have the time...

Urban Gardens, Bed Nets and Vitamin A

So lots of little things and big things happened this month. All in all, it was an exausting month, though I cant claim i was real productive or anything at any point.

A few weeks ago i had a wwoof volunteer come and stay at my house for nearly a week. She was working with the organic farmer who lives in Dakar but owns a compound on the coast near me and a large garden in my village. She worked everyday spreading good 'compost-esque' material over the relatively rather dry and nutrient deficient soil in his plot of garden space. It was interesting haveing a guest for that long though i ended up just talking and talking and talking to her about everything that was going on with me and that I was planning. Prolly not the most interesting stuff ever, but i find when i am around english speakers and given half an opportunity i will just babble on and on about anything.

A few days after that, and after some other Seereer related adventures, another young woman appears at my house, this time working with a micro-finance NGO. It was really interesting getting a new perspective on things, things going on in my very village that i didnt really totally understand. It is an interesting endeavor, making loans for various projects and hoping against hope for success. But then that wasnt half as interesting as the dinner we had her second and last night at my house, a big ole fold of cow skin, with peanut sauce over couscous. Not the best thing I have ever eaten. One of the strangest, if not the strangest thing i have ever actually eaten. It was like a giant skinned ankle and tasted less chewy but no better than sheep stomache.

The next week I felt like I was actually doing something. What that something was, not so clear, but I was at least around when things were being done, so that some one could easily mistake me for having a hand in what was going on. I did two days in Mbour helping jen with an urban agriculture training. Well, helping is a strong word, I took pictures, which will be up soon, and provided moral support to the nearly entirely wolof presentation. It was of course really interesting though. We (jen me and a next closest volunteer up the coast, Ankith,) gave instruction on how garden plants grow, what they need, how they grow best, what to plant, how to plant them and so on. We also showed how one can plant in a variety of containers given that in urban areas, space is usually on the premium and soil quality is at the minimum. We cut open tires to plant in a Jen's garden demonstrates other amazing containers, from rice sacks to bottles, buckets and tables. In the end, I am assigned to help out one of the new gardeners, a Seereer speaker that lives out near me, so I will be giving gardening advice and all that whenever she needs it.

Later that same week then I randomly was asked to help out i a mosquito net distribution in my area. It was really cool but i didnt really help anything in the slightest except provide some entertainment for the health workers and garner interest (cause just what is that toubab doing in our village, anyway?) with locals at each of the nearby health huts. Basically there were a huge number of mosquito nets given out for free, based on the number of children in the household. First, health workers went around, talked to people and gave out various doses of vitamin A for kids under 5, then they got coupons to come to the health hut to get thier bed nets. I went around with them talking to families and giving out the vitamin things in the slightly larger Louly, two Louly's over from me. For some reason I had no idea the dispansaire there was so nice and taken care of, doctors, med students, a nurse from spain, tiled floors and clean rooms, it was amazing. I also spent much more time on the supervising team, going from health hut to health hut in different villages, maybe seven or eight in all, checking on their progress, inventorying supplies, refilling and redistributing vitamin a pills and bed nets. It was amazing seeing something so well organized and for such good purpose going on in my very area, with my very neighbors. My village wasn't exactly part of it. First, because we have no health hut so we go to the one one Louly in the other direction. But also, most folks in my village (or as they say, everybody) has a mosquito net. NGOs like to come and throw them at school children and sprinkle them out for various events. And so my village was one of the sources of help and not part of the recieving population for the most part.

Also that week, I went out to a Seereer town east of me with jen. Seh had to give seeds out to this farmer that she knows there but somehow we keep missing and failing to give seeds to. We had a confusing time not getting where we wanted to go and eventually dropped them off with some nice guy, got free fantas, and my month of good work was at an end.

A Thousand Little Stories

There are always about a million things that go on in my village that I see everyday and think, 'wow, i could write a whole blog just about that'. But of course, something bigger or better jumps in the way as i sit down to write and it is lost to time. I thought itd be nice to make a quick pass over some of the many things that have happened in the past days and weeks, (even months at this point) that I have not (and probably will not) otherwise mention.


Guitar guy. Ok, first one not in my village. In Dakar actually. Everytime I go to the big long main market in Dakar where lots of tourists walk up and down I get hassled by the same guy. Not sure if he recognises me or just always thinks i am interested for some reason, but i always see him. Down that street you can get things from wood carvings to glass paintings, sunglasses to scarfs, dresses to running shoes, phones and senegalese fabric, its all there. But this always finds me when market shopping is the last thing on my mind. I am headed somewhere or coming back from a meeting or somethign and he follows me. He holds out a couple small senegalese musical instruments. Like little guitars with big round bodies. He starts by telling me some outrageous price twenty, twenty-five mille. I half laugh at his hopeless attempt and walk away and of course then he follows me. I am not even barganing, not saying any price, just 'next time, next time, i have no money now'. And he just keeps lowering it, and lowering it. I am not even talking to him, not looking at him, not encouraging him or anything, I just keep walking. And always, eventually, often right before i about to turn down a side street or go in somewhere, he says 'ok one mille.' And always this makes me hesitate. I mean, they are not the best looking things in the world and they would probably fall apart with more than a small amount of abuse. But at the same time, they arent too bad, a nice little souvenir that could just sit on a mantle somewhere or something. And for two dollars! This always makes me turn and look at him, give a long frowning glance to his little guitars, before turning and going on my way. 'Next time,' I say, 'next time.'

Grat mephloquine dreams. So I have had several good memorable ones, here are a few. One was super dark, german expressionistic - lightning, huge manor on a high craggy plateau, bats, the whole deal. Demon vampire bad guy, me and nerdy sidekick had to subdue him, had him tied to a table but before we could put him out cast a spell that blew up the house and leveled the terrain. Thrilling. Second one, beach with palm trees, rocky brown cliff set back up the beach edged an emerald rainforest. Laboratory pearched near the top of the cliff, long row of glass windows across the front. Down in the surf, in the loudly crashing waves and the white sand, epic, cinematic, an African bull elephant head to head with a T-Rex. Amazing camera angles, ferocious fight. Woke up before the end, I think the elephant was going to win, tried desperately to fall back into the dream, no dice. Third one, was long and dont remember much of it other than that when I woke I thought it was surely the craziest string of events I have ever thought of. At one point, a group of PCV friends and I were sitting around eating jelly beans of unknown flavors. I had a dark green one, thought apple or watermelon or some such flavor. Tried it, was really not sure, then someone found the guide. Sea-turtle... yeah. Other people had ones like tiger, porqupine, moose, and there were non animal ones I dont remember. Mine tasted rubbery, salty, mildly fishy. Dont recommend it.

Tree names. So, I am sitting with a handful of village folks, men, most of them older, not my usual crowd though, but nice neighbors. One points to a nearby baobab, 'do you know its name?' This was one of the first words I learned, of course. I say the word. 'No no,' he says, 'Its name.'I try 'tree?' Wrong again. He tells me all the all the baobabs have individual names. Or, as I learn more percisely in the next few days, most of the big older ones do. As it is in Seereer, the way you say something is famous is to say that it has a name. The smaller ones, less than a couple meters wide, are too babyish to have a name, to have a story. Even some of the big ones just dont have names know even village-wide. I learn the main four in my part of the village, at first stumbling over unfamiliar sounds pushed together when I realize what they mean, its so obvious that i almost laugh out loud. Many are descriptive to their usual flavor of fruit, sweet like sugar or bitter or powdery. Some are related to thier location, the one that sits in a puddle in the rainy season. Others are more just other ranom stuff the tree is known for, one doesnt drop fruit when you throw sticks at it, one is where folks used to dance around, one is named for a guy that fell out of it and died more than sixty years ago (not sure how long ago, before this old guy i talked to was born), one is the monkeys tree cause they always steal the fruit. And the nice thing is all these names roll of the tongue in Seereer pretty well. 'baak koi age' for example, 'the monkeys baobab'. I wanna learn all the ones in my village.

Abdou. My little brother has recently begun to venture into the world of organized, even purposeful speech. He still generally tottles around aimlessly, but he will throw a word or two at you sometimes in a very cute little voice. Recently he was super fussy one night. He cried for a long while, wanting his dad, who was out and hadnt come home from work yet. My other younger brothers did their best to calm him down, but he generally wasnt having it. When dad did come home, he followed him around, holding his pant leg, repeating over and over, 'dad, dad, DAD! ball.' over and over. Eventually, just before dinner, my dad gives in, as is usual in my house. Another brother goes off to the local boutique and comesback with the a mini rubber soccer ball. He carries it around, kicks it uncoordinatedly around, crys when anyone else touches it or gets too close to it, he even refuses to put it down when he goes to eat. He pays more attention to the ball than anything else and in watching it to make sure it doesnt roll away on him, he gets most of his food on his shirt and on the ground in front of him. Then he wants, as is usual, to go to sleep on his dads lap. Well, first off, dad is eating so that is a tricky endevor, but he is persistent and gets up on his knee. But he wants to hold the ball clutched to his chest. He also wants to sleep, but everytime he starts to doze off the ball slips and falls and he starts crying, 'it fell!, dad, dad, DAD! it fell.' And when my dad gets tired of picking it up, Abdou gets so fussy that he rolls himself off my dads lap gets the ball and climbs back up. 'put your ball away in the room until tomorrow?' my dad suggests. No dice. Eventually Abdou falls asleep, both him and dad holding the ball to his chest. The next day the ball pops and Abdou more or less forgets about it.

On Kamolangola and More Year Marks

On May 7th through the 11th, my village hosted the first of a now yearly weekend of wrestling in the village. This was a grand occasion full of the wonders of traditional wrestling, Seereer music and drumming. It was the third to last weekend in the big tournament of wrestling that encompases a bunch of villages and towns around me. Folks all come in from the area whenever there is a nearby tournament going on, and most villages have a wrestler or two to cheer for.

This date also coincides with a year from when we swore in as legit PCVs and nearly a year from when I installed at my site. With this combined reason for celebration I wanted to have over a bunch of PCV friends over to enjoy the tournament and see my village and all that.

The tournament was a four night affair and for some of it I had folks over. In fact for one night I had six guests, all sleeping in my little hut with me. Needless to say, it was a tight fit.

I had been to another wrestling night. Back in January i went with a bunch of people from my village over to the next village over. We were the "Delegation of Louly Ngogom" which was cool. We got there near about sunset, so at that time of year, maybe around 7, we had dinner at 10, it didnt all finish till after 1am. And a night time ride on a trotting horse cart with no lights of anykind, a little frightening. The horse can see better than we can i guess. I trust...

Anyway, this one in my village, as it was near the end of the whole tournament, had weeded out and whittled down the opponents to a more managable thirty or fourty. So each night did, in fact, not run on very long. The wrestling was pretty good and got better each night even. They even sold food there. There was, of course, the Seereer singers, but unfortunately they were not singing in our Seereer, it was some other dialect from the south and so we couldnt even understand it. They were not my favorite part of the whole deal, but then they only sang for part of each night so it was ok. There was also about a dozen griots druming. They were very cool. People constantly went up and danced out in front of them. The wrestling itself is interesting. i took some pictures and video, but the video is so dark it is not even worth putting up here but i will put the pictures up at some point.

The arena was set up as this large square of stick fence, about an area the size of a football field or so, with a ring of wooden benches all the way around. There was a VIP area with judges and announcers and such. The drumers and singers were set there too and they had a few mics connected to big speakers and a couple of weak spotlights. The wrestlers are all out in the middle nearly the whole time. They each had their own areas to the side, with faithful helpers standing watch over numerous tokens and bottles containing water, oils, other mysterious liquids. There is generally only one match going on at a time, sometimes two though, and the rest pace around, dance, and look cool for the rest of the time.

Its basically similar to a greco-roman style deal, but they are donw as soon as one touches his head or back to the ground. They do a lot of traditional rituals and all act in a certain manner and are also dressed sparingly and usually have a variety of traditional tokens, arm bands, leg bands, ones that wrap around your trunk. Each match may be very quick, I recorded one that was no more than fifteen seconds, or they can be long, lasting many rounds, length determined by the judge, though i dont find the long ones as entertaining. At the first wrestling event I had gone to actually, the finals match went on for a really long time. After several inconclusive rounds, it was well into the middle of the night and the wrestlers were even getting obviously frustrated with one another, the judges called it, had a little meeting and declared one of them the winner. There was one really long match durring my village's event, but luckily they did not need to break it off early.

Anyway, so the wrestling was really fun, I will put up pictures. It was also a time to be silly in the village with guests, we climbed baobab trees and played board games - very fun. It feels like I have been in the village for so much more than just a year. But then again, this year is flying by way way to fast. One more year!


NOTE: way backdated entry is up about fixing up my hut WITH pictures, i think its prolly on a different page, its from april.

Fully Funded!

The latrine project has been fully funded!

I just found out a day ago that the PC website updated its information and now boasts that my project has achieved all of its required funding! THANK YOU ALL! To the people who I know and dont know, to my friends and family, to those that passed the word on and those that were more than generous, THANK YOU! I know there were even more people who were all set to give more, people who just found out about it and people with great kind hearts, -thank you too for your interest and support!

If you are still giddy in the giving spirit, I know there are other PCVs with worthy projects that are as eager to get funds as I was, so check them out!

My thanks will never be enough of course, but I will do my best to proceed with this project, document and communicate to yall how everything turns out qnd how appreciative the community is.

As for the current timeline, my village counterpart agrees that trying to get this done durring the rainy season is problematic for a variety of reasons and because it has taken most of this dry season to bring the project from creation to now, the best way to preceed is to begin the actual construction after the rainy season. Unfortunately this means multiple months of nothing besides securing the materials and transport to our village.

I will keep you all in the know as to what is going on regularly. Thank you all, again, thank you!

Moments of Silence

between the moments of screaming loud noises.

So just wanted to take a moment to pause. I have about five blog entries on the back burner, waiting for me to finish them. But then something else always comes up. That plus three more things i have ideas to write about soon. I never get enough cyber time.

What i really want to do is to appeal all of you out there in radio land, that my latrine project really needs money. Actually, with the lack of comments or feedback, I have no idea if anyones read this for months. So let me know you are out there and check out that web site, its over there on the right. or here again is better

https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=685-117

Seriously, check it out. There are hundreds of people with literally NO latrines. They would like A latrine. Help them out.

Clean-up Day

On saturday we had a mini area cleanup. Our burn pit was finished and folks had been throwing stuff in it for the whole week.

We had a little trouble over the week and i had to go around and explain a few times what exactly could be dumped into it, what could burn and what could not, what i was taking separately and burying and what was to be dumped on the ground as regular organic stuff. Ash is no good, dirt is no good, food stuff is a no, metal cannot burn, a whole lot of explaining.

Then saturday didnt start out so great. It was kinda just me picking up trash and a few random kids were either not really helping or where trying to help but then getting distracted with other stuff. I didnt really care that it was not a big fancy get everybody together and clean up. I had kinda liked the idea of just doing it small at first, starting with the kids and then the adults get interested when they see results and the kids grow up with the interest.

The afternoon was much better, i went and got my brothers and sisters together and some other kids came too cause they were so helpful and it turned into a pretty good afternoon clean up thing. In fact the kids had way more energy at it then i did and when the sun was about to set and i had to go pull water, they still wanted to find more trash and i had to stop them and tell them we could get more next time.

We first went to some spots where they knew they couldnt play cause of all the broken glass. I picked up all that and put it into my trashcan thing, along with lots of metal and lots of batteries. Everything else we gathered and dumped into the hole. Lots of fabric, broken shoes, plastic bags, candy wrappers, and other bits of things that people had thrown out.

We got a good amount of stuff from near the school. We didnt really focus on the school and next time we can get that cleaned up better. We got most of all the stuff from around that little intersection just outside of my compound and the surounding area. It turned out to be a whole lot of trash. The area really does look a lot better and the kids can run around, at least in a limited area, without a nonsensicle amount of broken glass to worry about.

That evening I burned what we had collected. It went up pretty easily and did not take long to die down. I will prolly go in now and take out the metal bits that didnt burn and then we can repeat the process again next week.

And I took pictures!